Canonical Launching Ubuntu One Storage Service
Canonical has begun beta testing a managed storage service — known as Ubuntu One (pictured) — that allows Ubuntu 9.04 users to share and sync files between multiple Ubuntu PCs. Here’s the scoop from The VAR Guy.
The service, known as Ubuntu One, is in beta and available in two formats:
- Free for up to 2GB of storage
- $10 for a 10GB monthly storage plan
At $10 per month, Ubuntu One won’t make Canonical rich. But Ubuntu’s installed base stands at around 10 million or more desktops and services, The VAR Guy estimates. And the potential user base for Ubuntu One is growing rapidly each month.
Multiple Revenue Streams
Ubuntu One represents Canonical’s latest attempt to build profitable recurring revenue services around the company’s popular Linux distribution.
Another Canonical initiative, called Landscape, involves closed source software that allows VARs and IT administrators to remotely manage Ubuntu servers, desktops and mobile devices. Over time, Landscape could emerge as a managed services platform for VARs that specailize in Ubuntu, The VAR Guy believes.
Channel Chatter
Meanwhile, Canonical’s partner program remains a work in progress — but there are some signs of momentum.
Canonical this month is launching new training programs for Ubuntu Server Edition, And Hewlett-Packard is expected to begin certifying its ProLiant Servers to run Ubuntu shortly.
In the meantime, The VAR Guy has reached out to Canonical seeking more information about the Ubuntu One managed storage service.
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how does this compare to dropbox?
i never believed i would see something like this for a GNU/Linux service > “System Requirements: To use Ubuntu One services, we require Ubuntu 9.04 or greater, a internet connection (broadband or faster is recommended) and Firefox or a similar standards-compliant web browser.”
Wow !! Canonical’s really keeping itself busy.
I think you guys should have covered Eucalyptus as well.
I’d like to know exactly how the Var Guy estimates the Ubuntu installbase…. Canonical has continually been less than forth coming about the methodology used to estimate the Ubuntu install base. But I’ll let that pass for the moment. Its such a long standing issue with how Canonical fails to communicate transparently that there will be more opportunities to take that head on again. I will say that its disappointing that the Var Guy didn’t press Canonical for hard numbers on the uptake of Landscape. Those are numbers Canonical should have a very accurate estimate of…unlike the installbase estimate.
If the UbuntuOne service continues to be Ubuntu only.. then it can’t be compared to dropbox at all really..as dropbox is cross-platform. The reality is, a for-pay storage service that is not cross-platform is going to be at a competitive disadvantage to services like DropBox and jungledisk..when users are given the choice to shop around for services. But its just coming out of internal private beta…its way to early to know for sure what Canonical’s plans are for this service.
The really interesting thing will be to see if UbuntuOne accounts are bundled with OEM Ubuntu installs as part of the purchase. When you buy a Dell netbook, and an UbuntuOne account is thrown in for free that might impact the uptake of Dropbox. But without multi-platform support, it will be difficult to get people to pay for the service.
And its not just dropbox and jungledisk… Gnome’s Conduit application also competes with UbuntuOne as a sync client interface:
http://lifehacker.com/398775/sync-and-back-up-your-data-with-conduit-for-linux
http://www.conduit-project.org/wiki/Goals
Conduit has the advantage that its not tied to a particular service provider..and it handles use cases such as syncing with phones and ipods. We’ll need to learn more about how Canonical is positioning the client interface as to whether it can be a service provider agnostic interface that lets you contract with multiple providers or will UbuntuOne be a toll road managed solely by Canonical?
-jef
Ubuntu One – Service de synchronisation de données sous Ubuntu…
UbuntuOne[1] est un nouveau service mis en place par Canonical[2] similaire à Dropbox[3]. Il s’agit d’un hébergement de vos données sur des serveurs à distance ainsi que la possibilité de synchroniser ces données entre de multiples ordinateurs….
Jef@4: The VAR Guy’s estimate of 10 million is based purely on anecdotal evidence. Canonical started saying Ubuntu’s installed base is around 8 million back in 2007. Fast forward to the present, and 2 million more deployments/downloads (lifting the installed base to 10 million) doesn’t seem far fetched.
Still, a few caveats:
1. How many of those users pay Canonical for service? Unknown.
2. How many of those old installs are still running? Unknown.
3. How many long-time Ubuntu users who have made multiple Ubuntu upgrades on a single machine are counted as “multiple” users? Unknown.
Lots of unknowns. The VAR Guy wishes Canonical disclosed more data, and he’ll keep pushing Canonical to share data.
@Chris I was wondering the same thing, how does it compare to dropbox? I was going to give this a shot in testing it out and comparing. The advantage to dropbox is that it is cross platform, which is one major plus.
Dropbox user here… going to give it a try.
var gguy:
why are you confident that the origina 8 million quote is accurate? shuttleworth is on record in the press that Canonical makes no effort to track clients. the assumption that ubuntu added 2 million systems would be reasonable….except…as of last october canonical was still using the 8 million quote..the same number they used since 2006. three years of essentially no growth followed by a 2 million jump in under 6 months. until the methodology behind canoniical’s numbers is made public for review its a house of cards.
Jef:
The VAR Guy does not think Ubuntu’s installed base is a house of cards. All anecdotal evidence suggests that the installed base is growing rapidly. Canonical had more than 70 sites set up to support demand for Ubuntu 9.04 downloads. New pre-install announcements arrive every few weeks.
But The VAR Guy must concede: A growing installed base should NOT be confused with paying customers. The VAR Guy, WorksWithU and third-party media sites must work harder to pinpoint Canonical’s ongoing revenue strategy. In that area, the media has largely earned failing grades so far.
During the Ubuntu 9.04 launch’s media briefing call, not a single reporter asked about Canonical’s revenue model, potential growth, financial challenges, etc…
Dell offered the Mini 9 with a Dropbox account for free, so I imagine when this comes out of beta then they will use UbuntuOne instead.
This could be very interesting and doesn’t Apple offer something like this?
I hope they do well to make it easy/integrated for at least the official derivatives (Kubuntu, Xubuntu, Edubuntu and Ubuntu Studio) and possibly the spin-offs (Mint, etc.).
Be really cool if it can be integrated with Ubuntu Studio to be used as an online backup location. For security-minded people you could encrypt the backup file before passing it up.
A lot of this will come down to, do you trust Canonical (which, for me, is further than I do Google, Microsoft or Apple at this point)?
var guy:
its one thing to make an ancedotal claim on growth….its quite another to put a credible number on that growth. if you are going to state a number then back it up with methodology.
adobe’s methodology for claiming 99% penetration for flash is an example of how you backup an estimate with methodology.
fedora’s client statistics would be another.
estimate methodology matters. just pulling 10 million out of thin air because it feels right is just self serving cheerleading….not credible analysis.
-jef
A bit pricey? For $5 a month, I am getting (from 1and1 linux hosting): 120 Gb, 2 domains, 1200 mailboxes. Of course this is not an online storage service, but I think it serves as a comparison point.
I think Canonical should reduce the fee to $5 a month, increase the storage and then they would probably see a large number of customers.
Leo:
you should watch the chatter in the ubuntuone group on identi.ca.
The storage/price points will change as Canonical gets feedback during the beta process. They are walking into a somewhat mature web services marketplace with this offering, they will have to be price sensitive to stay competitive. Unlike landscape, Canonical does have competition from third party providers that already have traction inside the Ubuntu userbase.
I don’t think Canonical is aiming to provide as flexibility and complexity of a full linux hosting provider. That’s not the market. They are going to shoot for a tighter desktop integration aimed a traditional consumer/corporate desktop users and charge a marginally higher price than a bare bones hosting solution based on the perceived value-add of that deep desktop integration. If you are willing to deal with a full linux hosting solution..then you aren’t the target market for UbuntuOne. They will be competing more with dropbox and jungledisk than they will be with a traditional full hosting service at least initially.
They may over time position it as sort of an Ubuntu specific version of the mozy backup service. It’s really going to come down to beta testers telling Canonical exactly the sort of use cases and features they are willing to pay for in a storage subscription service (including cross-platform support and pricing points). I expect to see the shape of UbuntuOne service offering evolve significantly over the first year.
I’m actually quite hopeful that this service could be a sustainable revenue stream for Canonical, providing some long term financial stability to support the Desktop oriented Ubuntu work. Hopefully Canonical will feel comfortable giving a status report in a year on paying customer uptake.
-jef
@Leo and most likely you aren’t allowed to host any files there that aren’t directly linked on your website. Spacious web hosting means nothing because they know the average user only uses a few MBs. Second comment, you’re paying for the sync and the hosting not just the hosting.
@ Jeff: thanks for all the info! Points well taken, and I share the hope.
@ Nathan: (also Jeff): I understand they are different services, I meant to make this clear, sorry. Maybe $10 is the right price point, maybe 15, etc. I just have the feeling that, at least in the US, $5 a month is low enough that it may change things qualitatively, and I thought I’d compare with my web-server as a reference. Of course online back up service figures would be a lot more useful
This new service is an interesting idea. It’ll certainly suit newbies who haven’t learned about shell scripting and mounting remote FTP file systems.
And 2GB of storage for free isn’t exactly a shabby deal. I’m just curious how they fund it? Free on the web normally equals targeted advertising.
I’d also like to add Canonical should have been doing this sort of thing a long time ago. Looks like they are finally realising their core market is home users that spend way too much time on the web.
Aikiwolfie: Do you really think the core Canonical user market is home users? Just curious about your reasoning. Seems to me most Ubuntu users are consultants, developers, enthusiasts … but not the traditional “consumer” crowd… True?
Joe:
Careful…. you need to differentiate between Canonical’s core “customer” market for services and Ubuntu’s “core” user market. They might not actually be the same group on average.
This particular service may very well target more traditional consumer electronics purchasers. I fully expect this to be bundled in with the next generation of Ubuntu OEM netbooks..the ARM based devices and to start showing up in Dell mini purchasing bundles..assuming Dell continues to ship Ubuntu based devices along side Android models.
-jef
Been waiting for this, glad to see it happening. I would also like a “ubuntu.com” email address which will be good advertising.
Dropbox user here as well. Dropbox has worked flawlessly for me, and it is very fast also. Very happy with Dropbox.
Not running 9.04 yet so no beta testing for me.
Zac: Thanks for perspectives. I will ask Canonical about their plans for additional online services and report back to you and the WorksWithU community.
@Zac : you can get an @Ubuntu.com email address by becoming an Ubuntu Member. It’s a forwarding address to your regular email address, but still.
“Joe Panettieri Says:
May 12th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
Aikiwolfie: Do you really think the core Canonical user market is home users? Just curious about your reasoning. Seems to me most Ubuntu users are consultants, developers, enthusiasts … but not the traditional “consumer” crowd… True?”
At the end of the day it doesn’t matter who is actually using Ubuntu. Within the Linux community there is an expectation that people who know how to do things with Linux will be happy to jump through all the hoops and vault all the hurdles just to make things work.
Looking at community forums like Ubuntu Forums it’s pretty clear this isn’t the case any longer. Linux OSs are now at the stage where people want to boot-up the PC and get on with life. It’s also pretty clear that when newbies are asking about Linux and how to get into it easily they are pushed in the direction of distributions like Ubuntu.
While some of us like consultants, enthusiasts and developers might know a bit more about the technical workings of Linux. At the same time we’re all asking for an OS that just works. None of us wants to be firing up a terminal session just to mount a CD-ROM or DVD. None of us wants to have to manually edit the xorg.conf just because we have an SLI setup.
What we want is something that “just works”. That is an OS that assumes we have no technical knowledge and that is a consumer targeted OS.
When all you want to do is boot-up and get on with life, you are a consumer. Pure and simple. That is primarily what people want to do with Ubuntu. Even the developers.
The way you get to that ease of use level of perfection is by targeting people who know nothing about how things work.
I think this illustrates the point nicely.
http://lunduke.com/?p=429
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dragonbite: Thanks. But, my knowledge is not enough to be an Ubuntu member.
Joe: Thanks for your feedback.