The article talks about a resource such as file sharing. What is he like? Why do we need file hosting services and why are they gradually replaced by torrent trackers?
The beginning of the computer age
Once upon a time, computers were the attribute of only research centers, they took up a lot of space, weighed hundreds of kilograms, and the computing power compared to the current ones was just ridiculous. Fortunately, digital technologies have developed and are developing by leaps and bounds, and in our time almost everyone can afford a computer, both for work and for entertainment purposes. Naturally, with their popularization, the need for data transfer methods grew, whether it be a movie, music or a program. Initially, floppy disks helped, and later laser disks and flash drives. But how to transfer a file if the receiver is very far away? This is precisely what contributed to the development of such a thing as a resource intended for file sharing. But what is file hosting? How does it work and does it have a future? In this we will figure it out.
the Internet
Imagine that you have a certain file, whether it be a working document or something else, and you need to transfer it to another person. You can do this in different ways: on a disk, flash drive or memory card. But what if the recipient is very far away? In this case, the Internet comes to the rescue. More recently, many only dreamed about unlimited fast access to the Network, but now you will not surprise anyone. So what is file hosting? This is an intermediate server, a repository of information on which the user uploads something, and after that gives a download link to the recipient. Simply put, this is a kind of digital "intermediary" that provides access to files via the Internet. To protect information, you can set a password, without which a third party will not download anything, and also set the life of the information, after which it will be deleted. So now we know what file sharing is.
But why such a process is needed if any file can be sent via attachment in an email, through some messenger and the same “Skype?” Just not everyone. All of them have a restriction on the size of the document being sent, and for the last two methods it is necessary for the addressee to confirm receipt, otherwise the transfer will not take place. And with file hosting everything is simpler: you just need to send a link to a person, and he will decide when to download the information. But the purpose of such resources does not end there.
Multimedia
Most of these services were originally created not for purely working forwarding, their main purpose is a wide exchange of information. Simply put, users upload a huge amount of music, books, films and programs to these servers, after which they share links. Various sites also resort to their help. For example, you have created a platform on which reviews for various software are posted and you can download it. But all this takes up a lot of space, and it is much more profitable to place files on exchangers, and simply give links to them on your resource.
Several major scandals were associated with such activities, which led to the closure of the international file sharing EX.ua, as illegal digital content was distributed through it.
However, in more detail we will consider two similar services, which are one of the most popular in Russia and in the post-Soviet space. They belong to Yandex and Mail.ru.
File hosting "Yandex"
This service was one of the first to provide the ability to conveniently download and share files, for access you only needed a Yandex account. At the moment, the service called Yandex.Narod is closed. There is no access to it. He was replaced by a new one - Yandex.Disk, and this is a full-fledged cloud storage. In fact, the previous possibilities in downloading and sharing files remained, but a number of interesting and useful functions were added, and the main one is the synchronization of data on a working computer and information on a server. So the new Yandex file hosting service is no worse than the previous one.
"Mail.ru"
A similar story happened with this company, there was a service called "Files of Facebook", but due to the transition, again, to cloud technology, access to it was closed. However, if users have information left there, they may not worry. She did not leave, and it can be transferred to the "cloud". The Mail file hosting service was very popular because it automatically saved data that was too large to be sent as an attachment to an email.
This company also held several profitable campaigns to attract users to the new "cloud" technology. So, all users were provided with free disk space of 100 GB, and later, in connection with the exit of the service from the testing stage, even a terabyte. This is much more than that of competitors, where only 3-5 GB is initially provided, and storage can be expanded only for money. So the Mail file hosting service is deservedly popular.
registration
One of the aspects that pushed users away from file storage is registration. Since not everyone uses them on an ongoing basis, there was little to go through the tedious registration process. In addition, many sites deliberately limited the download speed if the user is not authorized, or did not allow downloading large data. Now you can select My-Files.RU as a good file hosting without registration.
Most of these services over time began to introduce paid subscriptions, which allowed to remove restrictions on speed, file types and their sizes. But today, torrent trackers are gradually and confidently taking the lead. Most of them do not require registration, viewing advertisements, fees, and the speed is unlimited. So file sharing ru-zones lose their audience. However, like all others.