Since its public launch in February 2012, the cloud file transfer system know as Gobbler has made inroads with all types of music producers—from students to professionals—with its cloud-based system that aims to provide an organized and safe storage place for all types of pro-audio projects. Recently, Pro Sound News caught up with Gobbler CEO Chris Kantrowitz to talk about the success of the service and future initiatives to help the service grow.
The idea for a pro audio-specific cloud for digital media creators first came to Kantrowitz while he was designing video-screen visuals for major concert tours. “I was finding a number of limitations (with storage),” Kantrowitz told Pro Sound News. “There was an issue with artists producing work and they would have their stuff all over the place. With all that money and time spent (to produce a song), they should have a place to keep everything.”
And while working with some big-name musicians, Kantrowitz said he saw some artists lose valuable work when their hard drives crashed. “I thought, if this guy is having these issues, then everyone is having these issues.”
This initial idea led Kantrowitz to develop Gobbler, where users can use the cloud to backup, transfer and organize their audio projects. “The goal is to improve workflow. All you have to do is hit a button and store it in a familiar place.”
Following a lengthy public beta-test, Gobbler officially launched in early 2012 and has since been talking with a number of software and hardware companies about integrating products with Gobbler. In January 2013, Gobbler announced a new integration with Avid Pro Tools, allowing users to share directly through the Pro Tools interface, while also protecting their progress within Gobbler.
“Going back to the beginning of the company, we spent a lot of time getting to know other companies. Avid was one of the first to approach us, but we’re in talks with just about everyone at this point,” Kantrowitz said. “We plan to integrate with more companies over the next year.”
While Gobbler doesn’t currently have a music playback mode, it is integrated in with Soundcloud, and helps musicians upload a large amount of music files to Soundcloud at once.
Kantrowitz also said the company is working on improving the service internally, and hope to provide users with faster uploading and new mobile features over the next year. “We have two big things (that we’re working on): one is we’ve completely rewritten our Mac App, and we’re hoping to launch that within the next month. We’re also working on a new uploading and downloading system that is way faster than our current system,” Kantrowitz said.
With thousands of users joining Gobbler weekly, Kantrowitz said one of his favorite parts about the service is seeing music produced all over the world. “I look at our analytics and see people making music in Venezuela. People are making music all over the world. We help enable that and work across countries, and it’s really cool to see that,” he said.
Gobbler
www.gobbler.com
