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The Godfather · Dec 9, 2009, 09:34 PM

And is Chrome OS simply the Trojan Horse that will get us hooked on applications that can be ripped from our hardware, but returned for a ransom?

dzp111 · Dec 9, 2009, 09:41 PM

I personally am not sold on cloud computing. Too "cloudy", too wide open, for now, for me.

Heck. I'm not even sure what the term means anymore. I asked about it on different forums and have received different definitions.

Not convinced. Yet.

besson3c · Dec 9, 2009, 11:23 PM

Cloud computing has huge ramification for business, virtualization is already an absolutely integral part of how we design IT infrastructure. On the consumer end, this is a little less cut and dry.

The Godfather · Dec 11, 2009, 02:09 AM

I've read about the role of virtualization in cloud computing. Seems to me that VMs will give benefits to all web services, SaaS or not. While I agree on the importance of VMs and other infrastructures, I don't know how it helps with the question: is cloud computing a plot to make us dependent on a tether to Google, while taking away our power to protect our privacy?

besson3c · Dec 11, 2009, 02:44 AM

Originally Posted by The Godfather

I've read about the role of virtualization in cloud computing. Seems to me that VMs will give benefits to all web services, SaaS or not. While I agree on the importance of VMs and other infrastructures, I don't know how it helps with the question: is cloud computing a plot to make us dependent on a tether to Google, while taking away our power to protect our privacy?

Not will, are giving benefits.

I can't really answer your question without really understanding what the definition of cloud computing is. In a private company cloud, the question of the tether and privacy issues are obviously far less relevant. The question of Google/privacy/lock-in seems to be more of a question of whether these free services are a plot, not so much that they are a cloud service. A company can be equally invasive with a Desktop application too.

To this question I say yes, this is a bubble, and it will burst with negative consequences. The internet has setup this unsustainable set of expectations that everything on it is free. Running Google like infrastructure is *damn* expensive. Most people don't realize or think of this, and just sort of think about their free email as coming from this sort of magical place that's just always there and always free. Some people might be aware of the strings that are attached, but few seem to really have the curiosity to know what they are and how this might affect them.

On multiple occasions in here I've stated that GMail is not free, and that we pay for this service by allowing them to mine our data. The response I got was telling: accusations that I was paranoid, or that their email had nothing of value anyway. The paranoid accusation is a little troubling to me. It is not paranoia to state that data mining is going on, this is factual. These free service providers don't provide free service out of the goodness of their hearts.

This sort of blissful lack of concern or awareness *is* going to lead somewhere, I think. Our economy as a whole seems to be centered around bubbles, and at the heart of this is clever people finding clever ways to monetize stuff, to push the envelope and go unnoticed. The envelopes of our privacy, who has access to what information, what sort of information is collected, distributed, whatever *will* be pushed, if not so already.

The problem is, if the government were to slap the wrists of some of these companies or customers revolted and moved somewhere else, we're still screwed. It can be very hard to get your data off of these free services that are designed to lock you in. Even if a customer decides to close off their email account, for example, whether these emails are deleted from the server or not the damage has already been done. What percentage of people are going to have the know-how and patience to move their email to a new account? What about if a company decides to start charging you for using their service? There is very little in the way of consumer protection when it comes to free service, and nobody reads user agreements anyway.

The same can be said for free online storage, Google docs, whatever... This is not just a question of free email provided by a cloud service.

olePigeon · Dec 11, 2009, 10:40 AM

Cloud computing is just a fancy name for SaaS. It's pretty cyclical. Computers don't do what people want, so they tout how clusters, servers, and mainframes should do it for them. Then technology catches up a few years later and everyone realizes how stupid it is to let 3rd party companies be in charge of what's on their computer. Companies start advertising how great localized computing is. Then servers get more powerful, networks get faster, then they tout how clusters, servers, and mainframes should do everything for them. Then technology catches up a few years later and everyone realizes how stupid it is to let 3rd party companies in be in charge of what's on their computer... wait, I'm repeating myself.

besson3c · Dec 11, 2009, 10:45 AM

I really don't think that cloud computing is a fad, at least not this time. There is a lot of investment in it, a lot of success with certain apps, the emergence of devices like the iPhone with limited local computing power, etc.

rjenkinson · Dec 11, 2009, 11:38 AM

Originally Posted by olePigeon

Cloud computing is just a fancy name for SaaS. It's pretty cyclical. Computers don't do what people want, so they tout how clusters, servers, and mainframes should do it for them. Then technology catches up a few years later and everyone realizes how stupid it is to let 3rd party companies be in charge of what's on their computer. Companies start advertising how great localized computing is. Then servers get more powerful, networks get faster, then they tout how clusters, servers, and mainframes should do everything for them. Then technology catches up a few years later and everyone realizes how stupid it is to let 3rd party companies in be in charge of what's on their computer... wait, I'm repeating myself.

Sounds exactly right.

SVass · Dec 11, 2009, 01:09 PM

Long ago, there were central timeshare computers with keyboards on worker's desks. The vendor's charged about 5k$ per year per station in then year dollars. Some would like us to return to that model.

besson3c · Dec 11, 2009, 01:56 PM

I don't think it's the same, SVass.

Again, in business the benefits of centralized computing are clear as far as collaboration goes, licensing, sharing of data, etc. That ship has already sailed.

In the consumer sphere most of the internet apps are free, or else cheap subscription services. It's a different form of bait and switch. The business models are different, as is the technological upside in the case of business.

olePigeon · Dec 11, 2009, 02:17 PM

Instead of me choosing what products I want to buy and update, including when I want to buy and update, I'll instead be forced to pay whomever controls the software a monthly fee no matter what. It limits my choice and guarantees a source of income for a particular vendor, and that's exactly what they want.

I don't care for software as a service or cloud computing.

besson3c · Dec 11, 2009, 02:54 PM

Originally Posted by olePigeon

Instead of me choosing what products I want to buy and update, including when I want to buy and update, I'll instead be forced to pay whomever controls the software a monthly fee no matter what. It limits my choice and guarantees a source of income for a particular vendor, and that's exactly what they want.

I don't care for software as a service or cloud computing.

Doesn't it kind of depend upon the app, your area of interest, and the context?

A web based app could be a viable option for:

- a rental app for longer than the free trial period
- a cheap alternative to a desktop app
- an alternative to the desktop app options
- an app that enables easy collaboration between multiple people (desktop apps are generally poorly suited for this sort of thing)
- a platform agnostic solution

There are all sorts of circumstances where some of these apps might be attractive *options* to some people, depending on the circumstances. I don't want a web based app to replace my bread and butter apps, I don't even like web based email despite their popularity, but I might use Google docs as an alternative to Open/NeoOffice or MS Office, for example, if the content was throwaway and/or incomprehensible to data miners.. That's just me, my needs are very basic and almost always involve collaboration. If you wrote stuff for a living obviously this would be far less attractive to you.

hayesk · Dec 11, 2009, 03:03 PM

Originally Posted by olePigeon

Cloud computing is just a fancy name for SaaS.

I wouldn't call it Software as a Service. Cloud computing is just a fancy name for storing your live data on a server.

ghporter · Dec 11, 2009, 07:43 PM

Same Software (as a service), Different Description. I like the "technical" articles (often written by sales people) that tout the "important differences" between the two. These important differences are almost all based on how the service is charged for, not how one is actually different from the other-which of course they're not.

SaaS touted remote storage as well. Storage is not much cheaper and easier to use, but it's always been part of the paradigm. Oh, and anyone who uses Yahoo! mail or GMail is already using SaaS/cloud computing, including the remote storage. Very handy, but completely out of my control, so I don't use them for anything sensitive.

The Godfather · Dec 12, 2009, 12:14 AM

Imagine Peoplesoft moving their HR software to the cloud and knowing each and all of us earnings, for a license discount that will be too hard to pass up.

residentEvil · Dec 12, 2009, 08:44 AM

...note: specific hardware, software and business names will not be mentioned; but is in the educational field...

a benefit for the "cloud" (whatever term you want to use):

company sells a software product.

tens of thousands of business use said software product. thousands of those business have a support team and income to manage the hardware/software on their own. can handle the software updates. can afford to upgrade hardware on a given cycle. a few hundred can't; be it staff or finances but need the software (this is very common, so don't just say use another software, that isn't a choice). what do those few hundred do? for the last 5 to 8 years, some run old versions on outdated hardware that is no longer supported by the software or hardware vendor. so, for example, instead of each business trying to say, support 5 servers and a staff for those systems, they pool together and create a "cloud" resource. a location or two are chosen (for redundancy/backup) that has the physical infrastructure/bandwidth already and resources are pooled for hardware, licensing, etc and a support team in each location. those few hundred pay a fraction (monthly or yearly; take your pick) then what they would have with their own hardware, maintenance, training, staff, benefits...the list goes on.

those thousands that were supporting their own? see what is going on and go, wow, that was a great idea. we should do that too. in turn, we can then concentrate on other projects and free up people, resources and money for other projects. we can provide location space, we can provide this, we can provide that (usually in turn for a resource at another location that they don't already have. again, this is very common in education...sharing).

sometimes, as those business meet at user groups/vendor presentations for the software/etc, talk and colaberate and create even bigger "clouds".

as with everyone right now, budgets are tight. resources are a premium. coming from education, the above scenario is real and is happening now. across the state and across the country. for many, it makes financial sense. for the hardware vendors, they understand and are embracing it. as for the company that sells the software? the top two hardware vendors they endorse/test on their software on, are now partnering together and are planning on several country wide "cloud" sites. i see in 3 to 5 years, many of those 10s of thousands, will all be in the "cloud".

besson3c · Dec 12, 2009, 11:13 AM

residentevil: it sounds like your head is in the clouds!

residentEvil · Dec 12, 2009, 11:24 AM

i merely giving a real life example of a successful "cloud" computing solution; one that i happen to be part of.

The Godfather · Dec 12, 2009, 03:20 PM

I am going to agree on the value of a SaaS alternative for very expensive software, with expensive requirements, like for example those that require SQL-trained people to maintain it.

However, some SaaS/cloud software are trying to steal the thunder of Open Source alternatives like Open Office and Gimp, on the pretext that they are as cheap, before OSS grabs the pennypincher market. I guess those customers will be happy to give up privacy for the convenience of not lugging your work laptop everywhere.

And HR software is going cloud computing in a very heavy way. Why would you trust your organization's proprietary, competitive information to anybody outside the company?

SVass · Dec 12, 2009, 03:25 PM

Originally Posted by residentEvil

i merely giving a real life example of a successful "cloud" computing solution; one that i happen to be part of.

I happen to be a customer of a company that may make a version work. 23andME sells a dna test and maintains a database for all of its customers. They can check these results against each other and estimate relatedness as in whether someone is a your second cousin or fifth cousin, etc. (Siblings are easy to identify.) At some point they may be able to draw a "parsimonious tree" showing the probable descent for a common group of customers.

So, I agree that data aggregation can be useful.
sam

besson3c · Dec 12, 2009, 03:25 PM

You shouldn't!

Every once in a while we hear about companies who accidentally leak social security numbers due to bad internal security practices. What I'm wondering how this is going to change when a SSN is leaked, for instance, *and* this is put in the possession of another company that is not legally authorized to have this data on their hard drives?

This sort of thing is a huge legal can of worms which varies from state to state.

residentEvil · Dec 12, 2009, 04:48 PM

if you think your you SSN isn't already in 3rd party hands; that well, really shouldn't have it, your mistaken.

in the US, take your local cable company. do you know how many people just freely give their SSN to them? its part of the information you "have" to give when signing up with them. in reality, it isn't. there is no legal reason for them to have it. they may say, it is for identification to make sure you aren't a credit risk, to make sure you weren't a customer before that stiffed them, etc, etc. a customer simply needs to ask/tell them they don't wish to do so and they will then go to the next "identifier", usually a driver's license number (which is bad too, just not as bad as the SSN).

besson3c · Dec 12, 2009, 05:01 PM

That's a good point, resident, but it still doesn't take away from the idea that a company that has leaked any private info - be it SSNs, credit card numbers, legal information, company trade secrets, whatever would be in legal hot water by this data not being in their physical possession quite possibly without even knowing it until it was too late.