Yahoo! enters into the world of unlimited data storage

Just announced, one of the largest web companies, Yahoo! will offer their users with unlimited data storage starting May 2007. Jeremiah has been talking a bit about the online data storage industry as several companies large and startup have been entering. He argues that companies will pay us to use their storage…SURE, but we get paid at the cost of providing marketers with our personal information. I’m not too sure how the trade off works out, especially for those, like me, who hate telemarketers and giving my information away for free. Yet, I have a feeling this industry will be taken more seriously now that Yahoo! has joined the club…and who knows, maybe Hotmail will join too?

Its interesting how storage in general has evolved in just a few years, starting off with Yahoo! Mail the 4MB version, to SanDisk’s introduction of the 2MB flash card for the Canon PowerShot, to HP announcing the 160GB storage capacity for its PCs, to Apples announcement of the 30GB iPod , and now Yahoo’s unlimited email storage!

Yahoo hopes to set the stage and make it possible for users to have unlimited data storage. Hey, that would be the day, when I’m worried about “how” I’m going to fill my storage, rather than how much I have left. Will I fill it with useless stuff? Probably, but at least I can have the whole cake, and not just a piece of it.

On a serious note, I think Microsoft Outlook needs to take a big hard look at their storage capacity. At least I know for my company, I constantly get annoying email saying I’ve surpassed my storage limit…maybe Yahoo! will enter in the corporate world and be the next Outlook killer? Or how about Google?


Update: Allen Stern questions if it can really be unlimited?

AHA! There’s always a catch….