Pownce has announced that users can now share uploaded files to the public, and that files can now be up to 100mb in size. Users had previously been able to share files with other Pownce users.

It’s another attempt by Pownce to define itself as being useful at a time where Twitter has become the dominant force in microblogging, and now FriendFeed (most strongly supported by the occasionally friendly Louis Gray) has taken the position of the next big thing. Pownce has always claimed it isn’t a Twitter competitor (in practice it’s Twitter on speed), but a promising start lost steam due to the failure to quickly provide an open API, denying Pownce the third party app support that has helped Twitter become the market leader, and is now helping FriendFeed.

Image hosting is a no-brainer in terms of the feature set; Photobucket was acquired by FIM/ MySpace for $250 million in May 2007, and other providers including Rapidshare are known to be making good money. The question for Pownce though is public file hosting enough of driver of new membership when competitors offer hosting for free, often with desktop uploaders? Ultimately it certainly can’t hurt.