Competition is a fundamental element for any market to stay healthy. Lately, online storage services have noticeably ramped up their activity in an attempt to win more users. Today we learn that the folks at Microsoft are offering all Dropbox users 100 gigabytes free for a year on their OneDrive service.
Although I do have a Dropbox account, I actually use it very little. Personally, I'm a Google Drive rider, which currently gives me 15 GB free. Needless to say, all the companies competing in the cloud storage market have different mechanisms that let users increase their available space for free. However, the trend continues to rise: services have increased capacity one way or another, without the user having to do anything in exchange. One of the names that took an aggressive stance to promote its platform is Microsoft. After all, OneDrive will take on a very important role in Windows 10. The app received some changes last November that weren't entirely well received, but they were designed with the new operating system in mind.
On the other hand, those of us who closely follow hardware evolution have noticed that the latest generation of devices has limited local storage capacity. Tablets, hybrids, and ultra-thin computers average 16 or 32 gigabytes, which puts more pressure on cloud storage. The aforementioned Dropbox is the first option for many users; however, Microsoft decided to launch a special offer that gives those users 100 additional gigabytes on their OneDrive accounts. All they have to do is visit this link, sign in to OneDrive (a compatible account is needed, such as a Hotmail address), and save a small PDF file to their Dropbox account. The 100 gigabytes will be activated automatically.
Microsoft also runs a parallel campaign that unlocks 100 more gigabytes for those who decide to participate in the Bing Rewards program, but that option is limited to users in the United States. The 100 extra gigabytes of OneDrive for Dropbox users last a year, and afterwards you have to pay about two dollars a month if you want them back, although something tells me that by then they'll become free. One of the many plans of the Redmond giant is to prepare its infrastructure to offer unlimited storage in the future.
