Ah, there is a huge opportunity for a product here. Someone could make a lot of money on taking families into account (no pun intended) when providing "cloud" services. Let me explain through some examples:
My wife and I currently have Android phones. We have several choices for where we can buy music, apps, books and other content. Almost none of them allow us to share our purchases. Apps simply cannot be shared (please correct me if I am wrong on this point). Music can be shared but the process involves (1) purchasing a song on one of the available music stores, (2) connecting the phone to a computer, (3) downloading the song from the phone to the computer (incidentally, the only universal means of creating a backup), (4) connecting the other device to the computer (5) uploading the song.
Google Music does make things slightly easier. For one, there is less reason for backups. However, music purchased on one phone still has to end up on another person's phone via a computer. The situation is worsened by the fact that on Android your Google account is very deeply integrated into your phone experience. The only sensible solution I can think of is for us to create a separate account through which we purchase music, movies, apps, etc.
The situation is a bit better with Apple ID. At least here, as TFA points out, you can have a setup that allows you to not spend 2x or more on the same content, but also have individual accounts. However, the length of the article alone suggests that there is a problem.
The perfect solution would look something like this: a cloud-based drive with several areas: 1 GB of encrypted storage for private data, 20 GB for music and book storage, streaming capabilities for all videos. Anything in these areas should be sharable with a small set of people I choose to share it with. For example, when I buy a song or an app, it should automatically show up on my wife's phone. Bonus points for some kind of a parental control system (no rock n roll for my kids once I have them). Any photo I take should automatically be uploaded to the encrypted area but also optionally shared with my family. All the app data should automatically be backed up as well, so that I can continue using the app on my laptop from where I left off on my phone.
Note, that it is very important to also not share some things by default. For example, if I want to keep a copy of my private GPG key in the encrypted area, I do not want to share it with my wife. Another example would be a document with account numbers from my job: not something my family needs to see.
Obviously this is a tall order. Encryption means no capability to do de-duplication. Sharing apps is also a bit funky, especially I buy them from a third-party app store. However, this system would much more closely address the real-world patterns of how families use smartphones, computers and cloud storage. Whoever figures this out first will likely make a lot of money.
What I am waiting for is for Apple to come up with a version of an ID that is "safe" to send out into the world with a handicapped child that is incapable of doing her own updates, but that would allow the folks doing her care to ONLY do updates and not purchase items (on purpose or accidentally) that I will end up having to cover. Of course I find it particularly evil that some of the Sesame Street apps allow in-app purchases. I haven't seen a company rip off adults through their children like that since the old Columbia House Record Club...
My wife and I currently have Android phones. We have several choices for where we can buy music, apps, books and other content. Almost none of them allow us to share our purchases. Apps simply cannot be shared (please correct me if I am wrong on this point). Music can be shared but the process involves (1) purchasing a song on one of the available music stores, (2) connecting the phone to a computer, (3) downloading the song from the phone to the computer (incidentally, the only universal means of creating a backup), (4) connecting the other device to the computer (5) uploading the song.
Google Music does make things slightly easier. For one, there is less reason for backups. However, music purchased on one phone still has to end up on another person's phone via a computer. The situation is worsened by the fact that on Android your Google account is very deeply integrated into your phone experience. The only sensible solution I can think of is for us to create a separate account through which we purchase music, movies, apps, etc.
The situation is a bit better with Apple ID. At least here, as TFA points out, you can have a setup that allows you to not spend 2x or more on the same content, but also have individual accounts. However, the length of the article alone suggests that there is a problem.
The perfect solution would look something like this: a cloud-based drive with several areas: 1 GB of encrypted storage for private data, 20 GB for music and book storage, streaming capabilities for all videos. Anything in these areas should be sharable with a small set of people I choose to share it with. For example, when I buy a song or an app, it should automatically show up on my wife's phone. Bonus points for some kind of a parental control system (no rock n roll for my kids once I have them). Any photo I take should automatically be uploaded to the encrypted area but also optionally shared with my family. All the app data should automatically be backed up as well, so that I can continue using the app on my laptop from where I left off on my phone.
Note, that it is very important to also not share some things by default. For example, if I want to keep a copy of my private GPG key in the encrypted area, I do not want to share it with my wife. Another example would be a document with account numbers from my job: not something my family needs to see.
Obviously this is a tall order. Encryption means no capability to do de-duplication. Sharing apps is also a bit funky, especially I buy them from a third-party app store. However, this system would much more closely address the real-world patterns of how families use smartphones, computers and cloud storage. Whoever figures this out first will likely make a lot of money.