Interview with Mick Lubinskas from Zapr

Last week Delta Taph published a post about Zapr here. Today I am pleased to publish an interview with Mick Lubinskas from Zapr.

Svetlana: Please introduce yourself and let our readers get a general idea of your service?
Mick: I’m Mick Liubinskas. I’ve been working in tech/business/marketing for 15 years including IBM, Virgin, eCoast, MassMedia, Kazaa and now Zapr. I’m a consumer, Internet, peer-to-peer, content guy.

Svetlana: Does the name Zapr have any special meaning or is it a usual Web 2.0 manner to name a business with ‘r’ letter in the end?
Mick: The Zapr name is all about fast moving of files - Zap them around!

Svetlana: Everyone knows at least several files sharing services. What makes Zapr different?
Mick: The big idea with Zapr is to leave the content where it is, sitting on your computer, and share it from there. Zapr creates a normal URL to a folder or file on your hard drive and lets anyone you give permission to, access to see what that is and to download it. It’s really simple sharing.
Zapr is not like Kazaa or BitTorrent. It’s not big, messy, public file sharing. It’s personal file sharing only.

Svetlana: Will Zapr be changed a lot when it is out of Beta? Are there some features missing from the service now?
Mick: There are lots of great features that we are working on for the next version. I won’t give too much away, but there will be more permission options and improved browser experience.

Svetlana: Speaking of technology, could you provide some details on how you ensure privacy and security for the content of files stored on a user’s PC?
Mick: Security is very, very important for Zapr. You are giving some access to your PC to others. Zapr only ever lets other users access folders or files that you have explicitly shared out. We maximize security by making Zapr ‘read-only’ web serving. This means that information requests come into Zapr (e.g. “Show me a page with the folder contents in it” or “Send me this file”) but Zapr is read only, so no data or viruses can come in.

Svetlana: Could you give a hint on your further development plan? What new features are planned? Will there be something exclusive about Zapr?
Mick: Zapr is the only application which lets you share folders and files directly from your computer to your friends and allow them to access them through a web browser without downloading software or registering.

Svetlana: Thank you for your answers, Mick, I hope our readers will find some new information in our dialog. You are welcome with further news about your services here at Profy.

P.S. By the way, Mick told me that Zapr would mail a free Zapr shirt to the first person who comments on this post with a poem with Zapr in it. Everyone is invited to try!