Methods and systems are provided for synchronizing and sharing data objects in a cloud based social networking environment of the type including a collaboration cloud. The method includes defining a sharing configuration within the collaboration cloud to include a second computing device; running a dedicated client synchronization application on a first computing device; creating a sync folder on the first computing device using the client synchronization application; updating a data object using the first computing device; adding the updated data object to the sync folder; automatically synchronizing the updated data object with the collaboration cloud; and propagating, using the collaboration cloud, the updated data object to the second computing device.