Oh, I'm Sorry - Google DRIVE!
Why Google Docs Can Be Both Awesome and Infuriating
by Aaron Lockman
In the spring of 2012, Google released its new cloud storage service, Google Drive. It exploded in the general public right away, gaining 10 million users in less than a month and receiving generally positive reviews from critics, who called it “among the best of the free synchronization services” and “the best known free alternative to Microsoft Office.”
Yeah, all the critics love it. Except this one. You know why?
Because it’s the EXACT SAME THING as Google Docs.
Google Drive was hailed as this revolutionary new breakthrough in technology, whereas in reality it was just Docs with a few tweaks here and there. Docs allowed you to upload videos and pictures and other files as well. It gave you 5 free gigabytes of space. The only difference is that the system of organization is just different enough to throw the user off guard, but not different enough to be any more or less efficient.
Don’t change the name if it’s just going to be the exact same thing. It’s like if YouTube suddenly changed its name to YouScreen but continued being the same site. This change results in nothing but confusion for everyone.
“But Aaron! You’re just bellyaching about how the system hasn’t changed! What do you think about the actual system?”
That is an excellent question, I’m surprised you thought of that. And the actual system is not too bad.
To those organizationally stunted wretches like myself, being able to access one’s work on any computer in any location is priceless. And the fact that each document is sorted in perfect chronological order from when you last edited it makes finding things easy. Wrote a thing two months ago that you need? No more searching in the six million sub-folders you have on your hard drive. Just type in what you remember of its name, and POOF there it is. It’s like a huge document buffet table with butlers that put the food on your plate.
So for organization Google Docs gets an A. So what’s holding me back from a glowing review?
The creative side of things.
For those people who write creatively and want to be able to access their art anywhere, Google Docs seems like a dream. But when writing poems and short stories and the like, concentration is key. You need a quiet space with few distractions, and to be satisfied with making slow progress. Writing does not lend itself to multitasking, which is what the internet is all about.
The average teenager is becoming more tech-savvy and signing up for more and more services, which means more gleaming insignias on the bookmarks bar, more exciting and wonderful places where somebody constantly might have updated something. More things to look at besides the blank page. That’s why the emigration of the written word from the document to the cloud is worrisome to me.
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