AOL is getting ready to sell or shut down XDrive, it's web storage unit, because of its high operating costs. I suggested a few weeks back that this could be seen as troubling for other web storage and file sharing platforms, but Box.net apparently couldn't be happier.



The service is embracing XDrive customers in search for a new home with open arms. In fact, Box.net community manager Kendra Ott just dropped by this blog to announce that the company has launched a web-based transfer tool that makes it possible to automatically back up all your XDrive files to a Box.net account. Just remember that XDrive gives you five gigs free, whereas Box.net limits free accounts to one gig.

The tool requires for you to give Box.net your Xdrive username and password, which usually doesn't seem like a god idea, but doesn't really seem too troublesome if you want to leave XDrive anyway. And of course no one can expect for XDrive to launch OAuth just to make its shut-down a little more pleasant.

I was going to try out the service, but it looks like XDrive already pulled the plug on its sign-up without really wanting to tell anyone about it. The Captcha test during sign-up returns error messages even for correct inputs.