How to double your Google Drive, and other tech tips from a lawyer

The cloud storage wars are on. The big players are Apple, Amazon, Google, and Microsoft, but up-and-comers like Dropbox, Box, SugarSync, and SpiderOak are in the game as well. And I'm sure there are others.

As someone whose Christmas was once brightened by the gift of a 20 megabyte external hard drive (that was the size of a modern laser printer) I can't help but be amazed by the availability of all this online storage space. And much of it is free. Microsoft's SkyDrive gives away 7 GB for free—25 GB to existing hotmail users who upgrade. Other services tend to give away between 2 and 5 GBs, with lots of ways (mainly referrals) to increase your free allotment.

I use Dropbox to backup and sync personal files (including media files) and SpiderOak to backup and sync more sensitive files. But I have an affinity for Google products, so when Google recently released its Google Drive option—with 5 GB free—I was naturally curious.

Google Drive is similar to Dropbox, in that it creates a special folder on your computers, and then syncs everything you put in that folder with your Google account in the cloud. As I investigated the service, however I quickly ran into two potential issues.