I remember telling a friend about five years ago that we'd soon start thinking about the Internet as a storage space, an online hard disk. Things haven't worked out that way yet, largely because the cost of huge disks has kept dropping.

But there's a case to be made that the boundaries between local disk and the Net are rapidly diminishing.

Consider just two examples, the first involving backup options. I'm working on a new book, and needless to say, I want to make sure that all that research doesn't vanish if my hard disk quits. I normally back up to CDs, but a new service called Glorio has caught my eye.

Offered by Restorion (www.datasalvation.com) of Deerfield, Ill, Glorio is an online backup service designed for small business. You tell the software what you want to back up (or let it default to the My Documents folder on your PC), and, at the time of your choice, it will send all your data to its servers, where the files are encrypted and stored.

What I like about Glorio is its simplicity. I work on multiple projects at once, and when I get really wrapped up in some research, I'm likely to forget the daily backup. The Glorio regimen is painless -- if I'm online at the time I've selected, my machine will back up my information.

Restorion uses high-power security to keep your files safe. That encryption system works with a 448-bit encryption key. The physical servers are protected by armed guards and video monitoring, not to mention multiple backup generators and a completely redundant operating philosophy so that the failure of one component won't take down a single server.

Glorio's services cost $36 per month per gigabyte, steep for many consumers, but in range for home office people whose information is their livelihood. And with your work offsite, the chance of data loss drops enormously. Too many people leave their backup disks in the same room as their PCs. If the machine is destroyed, so are the backups.

As Glorio shows, when you use the Net for services you've previously performed on your machine, you can make tasks largely hassle-free. And that leads to an online photo company called Shutterfly (www.shutterfly.com).

We've been sold on the concept that digital cameras turn a PC into a photo studio. The problem is that you have to get the right kind of printer, buy the right kind of paper, keep your cartridges in good order and assume that the quality you get equals that of a professional developer.

I'm a total believer in digital cameras -- by letting you print only the pictures you want, you save all kinds of money on prints you would otherwise discard. But why not combine the beauty of digital cameras with the ease of the Net, uploading your photos for processing, editing them with online tools, and having them delivered to your door?

Shutterfly does all this, and I started to consider it after looking at some figures released by InfoTrends. The average cost of a 4x6 print ordered through an online service is 36 cents, almost 50 percent less expensive than a home print. And professional silver halide photofinishing still offers the best route for prints that you want to last.

The larger trend is this: Let your PC do what it does best, and find ways the Net can maximize your use of time. Glorio and Shutterfly take the best of an existing technology and improve upon it by offering online choices. Sometimes doing all the work yourself, though it may be feasible, isn't the simplest or the best way to proceed.