Reliable Unlimited Cheap Online Storage and Syncing Solution

So i've spend some time in the last weeks and months trying to find THE BEST solution for my problem. I have ~500GB of data that need a good damn Reliable, Unlimited Cheap Online Storage and Syncing Solution. Specifying:

• Reasonable price: ~ 100U$/year maximum


• Unlimited storage / bandwidth


• Accepts any file sizes


• Makes Backup of all my files (with versioning)


• Syncs to multiple machines


• Syncs external drives


• Syncs just specific folders in each computer


• Has shared folders (file-sharing with coworkers and friends)


• Shares specific files via URL


• Win, Mac and Linux client


• Web access to download/upload files

I've searched many options, including the populars:

• Dropbox


• Mozy


• Syncplicity


• Carbonite


• Amazon S3


• JungleDisk / Rackspace


• Google Drive (not yet released)


• Diino


• SpiderOak

And none of them have at least a big part of my needs. Here is the incomplete research template i did (on google spreadsheet). I intended to finish this list but since there wasn't a perfect choice, i stopped wasting my time on this.

The big issue is that:

• The 'Pay by GB' Solutions (amazon/rackspace) are too expensive for 100GB+


• The 'Unlimited Backup' Solutions don't sync (Mozy etc)


• The 'Syncing' Solutions (Dropbox etc) don't really backup (they sync) and none has unlimited storage

So i decided to wait and keep:

• My Work Documents: Dropbox (a free 2GB account) - which nicely syncs my computers


• My Photos & Collages: Flickr - its unlimited storage, so i still need to upload my older photos


• My Videos: Youtube & Vimeo


• And on the External Harddrive: 100GB of Music and 200GB of Videos (documentaries/movies) - this NEEDS some online backup....

Totally related to this, see Dan Ariely's presentation (youtube) on this year's TED, around 11min he talks about our problem dealing with choices...

Wireframing and Prototyping with InDesign CS4 p1

Two years ago i wrote a post about how i used Inkscape to Wireframe & Prototype. Now FF to 2009: while inkscape's new version (0.47) is coming soon (June 09), it seems that some issues (like Font Styles & Master Pages) are still on the future roadmap. So i made some research on what people were using and found that InDesign CS4 (ID from now on) was getting popular (with Omnigraffle, Visio, Illustrator, Fireworks, Keynote, Powerpoint...). My final decision came with Nathan Curtis presentation: Unify your Deliverables.

Here are the main advantages i've seen on ID so far:

• Master Pages and easy Embedding of other files (even indesign files, with the Frame Tool + Place)


• Styles for Object, Paragraph & Character

But on the downside:

• its very, very, veeeerrrryyy expensive - while inkscape is free & open source.


• the file sizes are big and proprietary - while inkscape is a SVG: clean, lovely XML format that even notepads and browsers read

So i'll try ID out for a while...

Here are some great resources i've found so far:

• Dowload the Eightshapes Unify Templates - check out their blog and specially Nathan Curtis' videos


• Read & Download the files from this Adobe Article on using InDesign CS4 for Web


• Keep one eye on my InDesign Delicious Bookmarks


• And the other (eye) on my Wireframe/IA related Delicious Bookmarks Bundle

more on this soon...

Google Profile URL = username = more spam?

And so i've created my google profile:

• http://www.google.com/profiles/112005484203762930233

Terrible URL don't you think?

So google gives you one only option: use your google account username. Great!

Butt ass they say:

"(Note this can make your Google email address publicly discoverable.)"

Well this will be a great resource for Spammers and Pricks.

Looks like Matt Cutts - from Gmail Spam team - will have some tuff days ahead:

• http://www.google.com/profiles/mattcutts


• hm, wouldn't it be: mattcuts@gmail.com ??

Thanks, but I'll stick with my lovely 24 digit number instead...

source: gmail blog

Moondog - Spend dark night with you (musicvideo)

Moondog was the best musician/composer i've been introduced to in 2008 (via last.fm's recommendation engine).

Here's a musicvideo mix i did yesterday of Moondog's "Why spend the dark night with you" with a video i got from archive.org. Enjoy below or watch it in Youtube or in Vimeo:



Or download it (from Vimeo) 7.4MB.

6 Collages with 1 National Geographic

Saturday i broke 2 of my records:

• Made 6 collages in one day (in a span of 10h)


• Made this 6 collages with only one magazine: the National Geographic Feb. 2009

So here they are:

Holy Science:


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Drunk Dreaming:


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Tiny Beings:


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Flying Lesson:


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Gilliam meets Larson


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3 2 1


You can download the full size collages (200dpi) on my Flickr (just click on All Sizes on each image page):

• http://flickr.com/photos/iurikothe/sets/72157613290308926/detail/

Or even better, you can make them yourself:

Just buy the National Geographic Feb. 2009 (in any bookstore) and use Scissors & Glue.

My Music Library

FINALLY!!!!

After years & years of gathering songs and transfering from one HD to the other, today i have finally tagged ALL my songs!!

Status:

• 13242 songs = 51.9 days = 99.23GB


• 36 Genres, 1234 Artists, 1805 Albums

My biggest problem was creating/inventing the Genres tag, as you can see in the screenshot of my iTunes (that i hate, but i'm stuck on it in my mac):


To read them, see the original size here.

Now my next duty is to listen & rate them ALL! including updating my Last.fm profile. So keep an eye there (now i'm checking my Ethnic genres out)...

First two 2009 collages

Here are my first two collages i did on Jan 18th 2009:



and: