Storage Costs: Starting in 1999, the average cost of storage per gigabyte has dropped around 45%1 per year. Hard disk manufacturers keep developing better technology to allow more data to be stored in the same physical space. (I.e. 3.5 inch for factor hard drives). As manufacturing of these components gets refined, the cost of the storage space continues to decline.   Bandwidth Costs From the end of 2001 through today, the average costs of bandwidth (cost of Megabit per month) dropped roughly 35%2 per year. A senior research analyst at TeleGeography, Alan Mauldin, sites two main reasons for the decline in the price of bandwidth: The cost to provide the bandwidth continues to fall and The increased competition between companies able to supply bandwidth.3   Server Costs Over the last three years, the cost to maintain various server configurations has declined from 10% - 18%4 . As manufactures are able to create their components more efficiently, software vendors are able to create more stable software and the competition of vendors that sell servers, the costs continues to decline.   © Doran Boroski, Compass America 1 Data provided by Archive Builders – www.archivebuilders.com 2 Data provided by Invisible Hand – www.invisiblehand.com 3 Reasons for price of Bandwidth - http://www.lightreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=59445 4 Doran Boroski, Compass America – www.compassmc.com