What is....DropBox?

How many times have you been in a meeting, or on a train or in a crowd or at a party, and someone starts talking about some social-web-internetty-media-thing-a-ma-bob like it's the second coming of you know who and you have no idea what they are talking about? It might as well have been a new laundry detergent in Croatia.

Me too. I don't pretend to know everything or even a lot of things or more than the next guy. What I do have going for me however is a want, no need, to know about things. New things and in particular, techie things.

So here's something new. I will endeavor to explain, in as few words as possible, stuff. Stuff like Facebook, Twitter, DropBox etc. If you have questions, feel free to ask.

DropBox

DropBox is a cloud saving and sharing service which means, that instead of saving things only to your desktop or another folder on your computer, you also save them to a remote server by sending them over the internet. As scary as that sounds imagine having the ability to save and retrieve anything that you have created and/or saved anywhere on virtually any device.

DropBox is more than simple saves however.  It also synchronizes your files in all locations. For example, you create an Excel spreadsheet on your Macbook Pro and save it to a DropBox folder that you have shared with a co-worker. The co-worker is notified that a new file has been added to the folder that you share with him. He opens the file and makes a couple edits, saves the file with his changes and goes to get that Beatles Bowl cut that he's always wanted.

You get notified that the file has been changed but you have moved from the computer in your home office to your iPad on the back deck where you have wifi. You open the file in Excel on your iPad and see his changes. He got a number wrong in the sales reports from Ohio and you fix the mistake and save it back to DropBox through an app on your iPad. He returns from getting his haircut, and after a quick rendition of "Help" in a Nehru jacket he picked up at a tag sale on the way home, sees the file has been changed again and he.....well you see where this is going.

I use DropBox to share pictures with my siblings and also in the production of stage musicals sharing costume and props plots and cast lists with my entire team (I direct a full musical with 55 4th through 8th graders every fall).

You could save documents at work and edit them at home without the attractive yet overloaded and heavy canvas bag full of paper that you currently lug back and forth. Reducing paper is good for the environment and reducing the stress on your poor back is good for you. 

What's not to love?

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