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Glide File Sharing Service Debuts

Posted by samzenpus on from the share-away dept.

Dotnaught writes "Glide Effortless has gone live. New York Times columnist David Pogue describes it as "full-blown online operating system" that's a mix of genius and interface awkwardness. (Glide has been covered previously on Slashdot.) Pogue concludes "Glide's core idea is unassailably fresh and useful. If TransMedia's plans for world domination fall into place, maybe it won't need an elevator pitch. Maybe 'You gotta try this' will be the only pitch it needs.""

25 of 226 comments (clear)

  1. Oh, ho... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...that's a mix of genius and interface awkwardness...

    Sounds like the night I lost my virginity.

    1. Re:Oh, ho... by JPriest · · Score: 4, Funny

      Do you think you could document your findings into a man page or something so the rest of us have a guiding light?

      --
      Saying Java is nice because it works on all OS's is like saying that anal sex is nice because it works on all genders.
    2. Re:Oh, ho... by Cleon+I · · Score: 5, Funny

      Right, like I want to get caught typing "man sex" into my terminal window...

  2. Sad people by pubjames · · Score: 4, Funny

    The Apple® Mac OSX(TM) version of Glide Effortless is scheduled to be available on Christmas Day December 25, 2005.

    Great, a reason for me to get up early of Christmas Day. Good thing I haven't got any family or friends!

  3. Secure? by SecureTheNet · · Score: 5, Informative

    Glide looks like a well put together app, and I imagine it will become quite popular. But I for one would never use it. I prefer to keep my data locally, for privacy and security reasons.

    --
    SecureThe.Net - Practical Resources for Securing Systems
    1. Re:Secure? by flyingsquid · · Score: 4, Insightful
      These guys can't seem to figure out what they want to do, though. Their site highlights Glide Personal, Glide Photos, Glide Music, Glide Music Shop, Glide Videos, Glide Docs, Glide Allmedia, Glide Contacts, Glide Mailshare, Glide Liveshare, Glide Calendar, Glide Timeline, Glide Shops... I take one look at this and think,"this is supposed to _simplify_ my life?"

      These guys seem to be (a) overly ambitious, trying to conquer the known universe with their site, and (b)confused, lacking a clear strategy or a well thought out business model... dude, that is just so 1999.

  4. Why would I use this? by xquark · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Why do they want my credit card for the free subscription?
    I don't plan on buying anything from their glide store, why assume I will?

    --
    Arash Partow's Philosophy: Be a person who knows what they don't know, and not a person who doesn't know.
  5. YOU NEED MY CREDIT CARD??? by Datagod · · Score: 5, Insightful

    What kind of legitimate service needs my credit card information to "verify" the details of my registration? I thought to myself, yeah, this sounds cool...give them my usual false info...then BANG...Please give us your credit card information even though you have selected the free account...We promise that no bad hackers can get your personal information... Whatever...these bozos wont last long... I use everything GOOGLE all day long, and they have never EVER asked me for my credit card.

    1. Re:YOU NEED MY CREDIT CARD??? by ortholattice · · Score: 4, Informative

      A made-up credit card number might get you into the free service unless they verify each one with the credit card company (which I think costs them money, although not sure, so they might not do it for the free account, but might wait until you are tricked into upgrading via the fine print on some T&C-like page you ACCEPT). On the other hand they may have a local validity check using the LUHN formula - see http://www.beachnet.com/~hstiles/cardtype.html - so you could invent a number to pass that check. I don't think this is fraud since you aren't buying anything with the made-up card, and it could never be charged to anyone anyway even if it matched a real one because the name won't match, but hey IANAL.

    2. Re:YOU NEED MY CREDIT CARD??? by ortholattice · · Score: 4, Informative

      Oh, now I see from another post that any made up credit card number will work. So they never even bothered to program in the LUHN check. (A well-designed site would do that, by the way, as a courtesy to the customer to provide instant feedback - without the "this may take several minutes" verification delay - when an obviously bad number is mistyped.) I guess I gave them more credit for their technical adeptness than they deserved.

  6. Credit Card? by Jackdaw+Rookery · · Score: 3, Insightful

    No way will I ever use this while it asks for a Credit Card when you click Free Subscription.

    Why would I give you that? Why do you need access to my money when I have no intention of buying anything from you. After all that was why I selected free.

  7. My prediction? Icarus-like nosedive.... by Chaffar · · Score: 4, Insightful
    Or I haven't understood the thing, or it's a completely useless service.

    So basically, it's a system that's let's me let other people see what I have, but they can't copy the file for themselves... Ingenious, from a legal standpoint, but I really doubt it'll pick up. From an older article: "The system is smart enough to identify copyrighted music that has been uploaded by users into the system."http://informationweek.com/story/showArtic le.jhtml?articleID=173402852

    If the system is that smart, why would a "no-copying"policy be required? Hmmm ? Since the files being shared aren't copyrighted, I shouldn't be prohibited from sharing them.

    Me says this is a piece of schizophrenic software that doesn't really know where it wants to be, and it probably will be too bandwidth hungry for most people to present any kind of interest.

    But then again, maybe I haven't understood the thing :-/

  8. Herald Tribune Web Design by nucal · · Score: 3, Informative

    Somewhat off topic, but I thought that the interface for the IHT webpage was one of the best I'd ever seen - it really minimizes the amount of scrolling you have to do and it felt much easier to read. Why haven't more news sites used this?

  9. Whoopie by nickgrieve · · Score: 3, Insightful

    David Pogue describes it as "full-blown online operating system"

    Right... so why on earth should I give his opinon any creedance when its ovbious he does not even know what an OS does, to me Glide... look like Yet Another Blog Site

  10. Re:Sweet - But no OSX 'til XMas by flyingsquid · · Score: 3, Interesting
    The summary doesn't really give a good, well, summary of Pogue's review. He notes some major problems with their interface design that make it difficult to see what the files are, or manage large numbers of them. For instance, he says "... figuring out how to do some simple tasks, like backing out of a photo container to your full collection, are challenges for puzzle lovers only." The review also says that there are "...some telltale signs that the company may have bitten off more than it could chew"- there's no help or online manual, apparently.

    The core concept is good. I'd like to be able to store documents online so I could access them from anywhere, and it would also be useful to allow others to see them. But a hundred megabytes isn't much in the way of storage (many of my graphics files are 10-20mb), and I can have twenty times that for free if I just email files to my Gmail account for storage. Sure, they offer more, but the problem is (as the New York Times is finding with it's TimesSelect premium online content) that on the internet, people are used to getting stuff for free.

    As for buying them out, I suspect that it would be easiest for Google/Microsoft to simply duplicate the site's functionality while improving on the interface and offering more storage for free.

  11. MS prior art by lovebyte · · Score: 5, Funny

    Obligatory:
    For a long time people have been able to share their documents, music, ... with everyone on MS windows. Albeit unwillingly.

    --

    I'll do it for cheesy poofs.

  12. As with... by MaestroSartori · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ...many others here, I find it very off-putting that I'm required to enter my credit card details for a free trial. That very requirement has just lost them a customer, since I refuse to provide credit card details to people who don't intend to charge me for anything.

    I remember free-trial-card-required things like this from a few years back, and I didn't take them up then. I don't really enjoy having sites store my credit card information at all, and wish they wouldn't. After all, what's to stop a billing error, or a hacker harvesting my card number, or a disgruntled employee using my card to buy kiddie porn, or anything else? One-off entry is much nicer. I just wish I knew for sure how many internet stores kept records of my card details, before finding out the hard way one day :(

    --
    Game dev and music blog
  13. Glide by GoatMonkey2112 · · Score: 3, Funny

    And here I was thinking that 3dfx's work was all for nothing.

  14. I've had this for 2 years already by dJOEK · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I don't see how this is new. It exists already a long time and it's called .Mac

    --
    Exercise caution when modding this message up: the author acts like a jerk when his karma is excellent.
  15. if it smells like shit... by abonstu · · Score: 3, Interesting
    the citrix www.gotomypc.com service offers a free trial - that also requires a credit card. i was pretty suspicious but really wanted to trial the service so gave it a shot...

    as it turns out, when the trial period expires they charge you for the next month, ie. its an *opt-out* 'free' trial.

    not only that, but you cant even email them to opt-out, you have to call them during *their* business hours... this really gave me the shits being in singapore and having to wait around till they decide to pick up the phone.

    lets hope these characters arent going down that path... roping people into ongoing payments is pretty high on my do not touch list.

  16. cc test number by Frogg · · Score: 4, Informative

    mastercard 4929 123 123 123 passes luhn10 -- we use it when testing ecommerce systems.

    1. Re:cc test number by MemeRot · · Score: 3, Informative

      The classic test card is visa 4111 1111 1111 1111.

      As another poster pointed out, your mastercard doesn't start with a 5, which they all do. Also, if you meant visa, you don't have the right number of digits.

  17. Yep - I stopped there too by CrazedWalrus · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I started signing up, just to check out the site. Got to the mandatory credit card, pressed Cancel, and probably won't try it again for a few weeks to see if they've changed it. If not, this'll be a service I simply don't use.

    Glide: I don't lightly give my credit card number out to random internet sites -- especially when I'm not buying anyting. I'm not paying for the next gimmick until I've seen if it's useful. If you won't let me see if it's useful without my credit card, then you've lost a potential customer, and I've moved on with my life the way it's always been.

  18. Disturbing Terms and Conditions by Hrvat · · Score: 4, Informative

    From TransMedia (Glide creator) Terms and Conditions:

    Materials provided to TransMedia or Posted at any TransMedia Web Site

    TransMedia does not claim ownership of the materials you provide to TransMedia (including feedback and suggestions) or post, upload, input or submit to any Services or its associated services for review by the general public, or by the members of any public or private community, (each a "Submission" and collectively "Submissions"). However, by posting, uploading, inputting, providing or submitting ("Posting") your Submission you are granting TransMedia, its affiliated companies and necessary sublicensees permission to use your Submission in connection with the operation of their Internet businesses (including, without limitation, all TransMedia Services), including, without limitation, the license rights to: copy, distribute, transmit, publicly display, publicly perform, reproduce, edit, translate and reformat your Submission; to publish your name in connection with your Submission; and the right to sublicense such rights to any supplier of the Services....

    What this basically means is that you're giving them management rights to whatever you're posting on their service. So if you're a starving artist and you store your next hit song on their service, they have the right to copy, distribute, transmit etc. that song, or just sublicense it to someone else.

    This is wrong. They are basically asking for you to give up all the rights without any compensation for it just by using the service. I definitively won't be using this service.

    --
    TANSTAAFL
  19. Not Ajax by MemeRot · · Score: 3, Informative

    Look at the page javascript: http://www.iht.com/js/articlelayout.js/.

    It's pretty clever, they just divide up the article text and show/hide it with style settings. If you do View->Page Style->No Style (in firefox) you see the raw page layout (including the full article text), everything else, like positioning the main article and everything, is CSS.