Why the Personal Cloud?

Cloud computing, designed for people

The internet transformed personal computers into personal gateways for global communication and interaction with other humans and machines. However, while many applications on the internet are designed with the user in mind, the overall experience of using a computer on the internet is not. People have lost autonomy and control over their data and must navigate a multitude of incompatible apps that don’t work in concert for them.

We believe that designing computers around people provides a better experience. The personal cloud aims to achieve this goal for computers on the internet, by prioritizing the individual user as the ultimate design constraint, as opposed to an enterprise or individual application.

A personal cloud is distinct from traditional personal computers because it exists online. It provides a private and autonomous space to use your apps and manage your data, while also serving as a personal portal to and from the world. It can act as a launchpad for interactions between your inspirations & creations, and the vast universe of humans and machines on the internet.

Discover something wonderful, make it yours, and explore what’s next.

For users

In the traditional cloud model, the company who provides an application holds a lot of power. If the company decides it’s not worth it to keep the app running and shuts down the infrastructure, happy users lose access. They also can’t easily interact with, extend, or delete their own application data. Or add a custom domain, or more RAM to a sluggish service.

On the personal cloud, this all changes. Users can install and uninstall apps on a whim, with fine-grained control. They can inspect, modify, extend, and export all their data. Since everything is in one place, it can integrate directly. For users who are also developers, the control is extremely powerful: everything is raw material to build and explore with.

For developers

Using the cloud providers of today, web developers with an idea need to do a lot to bring it to the world. They have to code their idea, but they also have to create, pay for, and operate the infrastructure to run it. This is a lot of work. For apps to serve users around the globe, this barrier usually requires teams of operational experts fighting a crazy number of cloud tools.

Using the personal cloud, things are entirely different. Individuals can build something for themselves, assuming they’re the only user. They can stop there, if they want. Or they can publish it to the world, and see it run everywhere. Anyone else with an internet connection can install the app, in another personal cloud. Throughout the entire process, the developer doesn’t think about operating anything ✨ at all ✨.

Space is a personal story. Deta was started by developers, out of personal frusturation with the existing computers on the internet. Read our motivation for building Space here.