GigaTribe’s mission is to develop a file-sharing network.
When we launched the company in 2005, we decided to develop a solution that is based on peer2peer architecture. Even today, we still believe that this choice is particularly suitable for the exchange of large files within a private network. The main disadvantages of P2P file-sharing are the fact that you have to leave your computer on and the slow upload speeds that ADSL connections provide.
These drawbacks have limited the use of the software to users who master the exchange of files. This phenomenon has been accentuated by the increasing tendency to focus on the concept of exchanging, at the expense of the concept of sharing: it is common for users to remove contacts that have been disconnected for more than a few days.
GigaTribe now finds itself limited to a community of experts in which newcomers struggle to find their way around. The persistence of a few technical problems since version 3.0 has also discouraged some users.
We therefore came to the conclusion that we had to start from scratch to come up with a stable and efficient service that can be used by both file-sharing experts as well as casual users who download files from friends without necessarily sharing in return.
We decided to significantly change the service: GigaTribe will allow you to share both the files that are on your hard drive and those that you have copied to GigaTribe’s servers. The user interface will be available through a web browser for ease of use on all platforms.
These changes are already underway: the first phase, currently being tested, involves the validation of the user interface and the online storage service. The hard drive sharing service (P2P) and storage service (cloud) will be grouped together within the same interface, but users will be able to use them separately. Those who do not wish to use the storage service will still have access to the current software features; the interface is the only thing that will change.
P2P sharing will still offer the same features that are present today. To share files that are on your hard drive, you will need to download a resident program whose features will be limited to the transfer of files. The interface with this program will be provided through a web browser, as will the other features (invitations, network management).
The pricing terms will not change:
- Ultimate users will enjoy advanced features and unlimited downloads via our servers.
- Premium users will retain their advanced features and will enjoy unlimited downloads when they are connected directly.
- Free users will be able to download up to 2GB per month when they go through our servers and will enjoy unlimited downloads when they connect directly.
The terms of use of the storage service (cloud) have not yet been defined. We haven’t measured the space and bandwidth that will be available per user. The cloud’s business model is also currently being discussed.
Storage on our servers will be encrypted and GigaTribe will not store the encryption keys. GigaTribe will therefore not be able to read the content stored on its servers.
The tribe system will also be reviewed. Public tribes, which are used to find new contacts, will be replaced by a keyword system. Each user will be able to assign keywords to his/her profile according to how he/she wishes to appear in searches. Of course, you can elect to not have any keywords associated with your username. Public tribes will therefore no longer exist and each tribes’ keywords will be assigned to all of its members. Each user may at any time remove the keywords that are associated with his/her username. Private tribes will continue to operate as they do today.
Integration with other social networks will be available as an option. The main objective is to enable the creation of new GigaTribe accounts using a Facebook username.
The forum (http://forum.gigatribe.com) hasn’t attracted a wide enough audience, it will soon be closed. We will keep the blog and the Facebook page to relay official messages.
We hope that these changes will meet the expectations of existing users and will make them want to share GigaTribe with a new audience.
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