New Cloud Services
Heard of Deezer, the French created cloud hosting for your music that offers a streaming service? Online or offline, enjoy your music no matter where you are. Co-founder Jonathan Benassaya is looking to offer a similar service exclusively for your photos and videos and has launched Stream Nation, a powerhouse cloud hosting service for those pictures and videos you have on your phone, camcorder, and digital camera.
No matter what type of file, Stream Nation pushes it to the cloud and streams it to any device imaginable. It's kind of like Dropbox with streaming capabilities.
New Cloud Services: The Need For Stream Nation
Benassaya was inspired to create Stream Nation after a year of testing cloud hosting services such as Google Drive, Everpix, and Dropbox. He knew that his work developing Deezer, especially regarding streaming, could become a prosperous new company.
“With Deezer we sustained more than two million simultaneous user connections, and we built it five years ago,” said Benassaya. While the idea of Stream Nation is nothing new, Benassaya believes he can help make it the first cloud hosting service for your photos and videos that is truly considered a cloud-based “media center” by its users. He likens its experience to a YouTube that exists for only you, negating the need for transferring photos and videos to your hard drive or backup service.
New Cloud Services: About Stream Nation
Upon sign up, you are treated to 2GB of free storage. Upgrade to a 500GB account for $9.99 per month, or go all out with an unlimited account for $19.99 per month. Install the Stream Nation app on your Windows or Mac-based PC or your iPhone, and start uploading your files! Just as with Dropbox, the apps know when you add new files, sending them directly to Stream Nation.
The Stream Nation website takes care of categorizing them, placing them where they need to go: Video Stream, Photo Stream, and Collections which are basically albums. Want to watch a video? Enjoy streaming the whole thing, rather than the first 15 minutes Dropbox allows. The service takes care of coding it specifically for the device you are watching it on. With adaptive streaming, you don't need to worry about how good your connection.
New Cloud Services: Private Media Cloud
Benassaya sees Stream Nation as different from other services. As of this point, you cannot share your files with anyone you wish. You are able to share with other users of the cloud hosting service, setting itself apart from Dropbox and Google Drive that allow you to choose who you can share stored files with. Stream Nation only exists to give you a place to view video and photo files from anywhere, on any device.
Another neat, yet controversial feature: the service allows you to loan out your videos and photos for a 24 hour period with anyone you wish. This is great, but could be a problem down the road. It's just like lending a Kindle e-book to a friend, with that specific file disappearing from your library while your friend enjoys it.
One thing is clear: it is going to be a tough feat. It isn't exactly easy to stream video to thousands upon thousands of users, but Stream Nation promises no waiting list as with other cloud-based services. Said Benassaya: “If you build a cloud storage company and you don't have a contingency plan in case you're a huge success, then you have a problem.”
Are you excited to give Stream Nation a try, or do you think it's just like other services you rely on?
