14 DAY TRIAL // Dropbox made a very interesting announcement today, users can now share any file or folder with anyone, even non-users, via a simple shortlink. What this means is that people will be able to share files with friends and content creators with their fans with just a couple of simple steps.
It may not seem like much of a big deal, but the announcement is big. Put simply, you can now drag a file to your Dropbox folder, get a shortlink for it and share it on Twitter, on YouTube, on your blog, with your friends via IM or your colleagues via email.
This makes all the cyberlockers of the world obsolete, save for some fringe cases and, well, piracy.
Unless you're trying to share a DVDrip of your favorite movie with "friends," there is one reason why people use cyberlockers, they need to share a large file for free. That's it. And you can do it now in Dropbox.
Most people have a few GB of free storage in Dropbox, so unless the file they're trying to share is huge, they should be able to do it with Dropbox, so space isn't a problem. There's no restriction bandwidth so you don't have to worry about how many people download your stuff.
And if the file is huge, uploading it to a cyberlocker and then having your friends go through the horror that is most cyberlocker sites filled to the brim with shoddy ads, scammy Download buttons, huge wait times and limited download speed, isn't all that appealing. And there's no guarantee that your file will be available a month from now.
Almost all legitimate uses cases for cyberlockers will be covered by the new Dropbox feature, from indie musicians wanting to share their latest album with fans to hackers wanting to share their modded Android ROMs. And they can do it for free with just a couple of clicks.