Is Dropbox a P2P / File Sharing site?

[sheamuspatt]

That's a bit of rhetorical question - it shouldn't be (right)? But, if you read the description:

P2P / File Sharing: Sites that facilitate the sharing of digital files between individuals, especially via peer-to-peer software, including torrent sites

then, even though it isn't a "torrent site", it does fit the definition as it "facilitates the sharing of digital files".

This category is of little use if it includes sites like Dropbox. I'm bringing this up because, even though Dropbox has not (yet) been tagged as P2P / File Sharing, the cloud service I actually use, UbuntuOne (one.ubuntu.com), was recently tagged as such. I'm not happy; my sync got stuck for weeks until I discovered OpenDNS was blocking it.

Can we tighten up this definition a bit? Perhaps say the "public" sharing of files. As long as they're only shared with specific authenticated users (as Dropbox, UbuntuOne and other cloud storage services usually do), there's not a big risk of copyright exposure. These sites are already in the File Storage category, or should be; they don't belong in P2P which, in my view, should be limited to sites where copyright infringement is easy to do.

[skeezer]

Dropbox is as much a complicated challenge to properly tag as I imagine Evernote.com might be.

Like a Swiss Army Knife, both can be used for multiple functions.

I use Dropbox literally "AS" my hard drive, same folder hierarchy etc. because it allows me to move easily between computers and WHEN a piece of hardware fails, I can be back up and running almost immediately or access documents from any computer globally.

HOWEVER, Dropbox "does" have the capability to "share" not just individual files but entire folders both publicly and P2P one on one.

Same thing with Evernote.com. I use that for many, many different things - note taking, contact management etc.; HOWEVER, the functionality of Evernote allows me to "share" a Notebook with the public or an individual user.

These two sites, which also have companion software programs for desktop and mobile, are not in and of themselves "File Sharing" or "Sexual".

Like many applications that now sync with the "cloud", they have many applications and it is entirely dependent upon how the individual USER is using them. In and of themselves they are not nefarious. To say that they are and that they should be blocked is a bit like saying one can can technically send a sexual image via email so email should be blocked.

Perhaps a sub-category should be added File-Sharing > Caveat, with the ability to provide notes; or Multi-Use > See Notes

[rotblitz]

It's much easier: the ones who want to have it blocked, simply add it to their "always block" list. This is what this feature is good for. No need to discuss whether or not it could belong to a certain category.

[odyss3y]

rotblitz: it should be the opposite. since it fits the category, it should be blocked, and people who want exceptions could add it to never block.  thats what opendns is good for.

[rotblitz]

"it should be the opposite. since it fits the category"

No, it doesn't. Its primary purpose and common use is certainly not P2P/File sharing, but File storage. Just that it could be used as such doesn't qualify it for this tagging.

[Brian Hartvigsen]

I'm closing this thread as the discussion has become circular at this point.  We have already stated our standing and reasoning on the classification.  Different people will always have different opinions and that's what makes having a Blacklist (or Whitelist) such a great feature.  Regardless of how we categorize a domain, you always have the ultimate decision on how the domain should be treated on your network.