In reply to Jerry.

Jay,

I've obviously failed to make my point.

iCloud and Dropbox are VERY different by their nature. Dropbox is a file based solution, iCloud can be integrated with applications as an extension of the document.

Does that make sense? If I write an iCloud app I don't have to do anything to download a file to my computer to edit it. It's there and the changes are saved for me, real time. It's very subtle, but it is definitely different.

I'm not bagging on Dropbox, rather, I'm trying to point out the differences between the two technologies. iCloud is tightly integrated, Dropbox is loosely integrated. With iCloud the concept of files goes away, it's just data, and it's tightly coupled to the application that created it.

The idea that Dropbox runs on different platforms doesn't keep you from lock in. It's unlikely to happen, but what if Dropbox goes away tomorrow and you've written an application that uses its' API? Where does that leave your app? It will stop operating until you can move to a different syncing API, same is true of iCloud. If Apple dropped iCloud as a supported platform apps will break.

If iCloud and/or Dropbox API's and protocols were open standards the user would have a choice to save, or move, their storage to any system that supported those open standards.

I hope that clears the point up a bit? I'm not bagging on Dropbox. I use the service every day to sync files between my Mac, PC's, and my iOS devices. It's flawless.