The piece would probably have been improved by staying on your initial course and focusing on Bitcasa's business model, and the impact that certain specific technical choices have on the running costs.<p>Instead, after a strong introduction, you switched over to discussing these "Potential Flaws", which are no different than those facing every cloud storage vendor. It seems strange to write an attack-piece on this new player, rather than on the industry as a whole.<p>1. Bitcasa can kick/cancel abusive or uneconomic accounts. Preventing them rejoining is tricky, but no harder for Bitcasa than any other internet service (from some tiny 10-user internet forum via Dropbox right through to Amazon), so why single them out?<p>2. "any provider of this service <i>could be</i> legally responsible" (my emphasis) is just weasel words.<p>3. Bitcasa can tell whether I have a particular file, but (at least in the general case) can't tell whether I'm licensed or authorised to have that copy.<p>4. See 1.<p>(Also, the "convergent encryption" link is broken.)
Just wondering: if I were to use such a service and rely on some client they provide, I would probably encrypt all my content myself, then give it to the client. Maybe even install an extra VM just for the purpose, so that the client can get no access to my "real" system.
<i>There is an exciting new company Bitcasa that promises infinite storage for $10 a month and says your data is encrypted client side. </i><p>Isn't it what Backblaze has been offering for a few years now for half that price? I cannot say I'm particularly excited.
Re: 2 ("the rapidest share"): you can simply force clients to upload a file at least once before being allowed to download it. That is what Dropbox did after people pointed out this issue.