The way I hear most pundits in the talkbacks here describe it, Cloud Computing is over-hyped, impractical and unnecessary.
- I *want* control over *my* data. Not some mega corporation (Google, Amazon, or Microsoft).
- I want localized hardware.
- I want a localized OS/Apps. None of that web app crap.
- If I want to share something over an Internet connection, then I will send it over an e-mail. Any files that I need to transport back and forth I have placed on a jump drive attached to my key-chain with backups made every night.
- Networking wise, Cloud Computing, is again impractical. People can't look more than 5 minutes in front of them and realize that our network infrastructure just would not be able to handle the bandwidth. It creates more traffic on already over crowded "expressways".
Have you ever sat in a school cafeteria with a thousand other students trying to all access the wifi at the same time? Or even at school/work in the morning when everyone is accessing the servers to log on. It's slow as hell and completely unreliable. Trying to fight everyone else to get my data, would be a nightmare. It would take years to catch up our infrastructure to do something of this magnitude. That money and time is better spent elsewhere.
- Security wise, it adds more complexity, much more complexity. Physical and virtual security both come into play here. Do you trust XYZ Co. to keep your data secure? Who has access to it? What are they doing to prevent unauthorized access? Where are they putting it? Are you willing to admit that anything and everything you store there (Willing or unwillingly - Yes, I'm looking at you ChromeOS) will be made available to others, whether it is hacked or otherwise simply mishandled? Yes, Virginia, a server is a server, is a server. They can be hacked into just like any other computer. Some of you on here seem so willing to throw your lives into Google's hands, but yet are unwilling to ask the hard questions.
- Lastly, why do we need it? What significant advantage does this give us over the way we run things now?
While doing my morning news scan, I came across the article ‘Cloud Computing’: What Exactly Is It, Anyway? By Roger Cheng of the Wall Street Journal. Although not an attempt to establish a complete framework, the article is likely to be helpful to business people.
Analysts, on the other hand, like to create a more complete description that broadly defines a topic and examines the components. The Cloud Codex has been very useful for 451 Research subscribers because it is comprehensive.
We’re well beyond the definitional phase of research and are starting to delve more deeply into use cases, best and worst practices as well as trying to understand what over 200 suppliers are doing in this area.
At first glace, cloud computing appears to just be a rehash of past IT stories. We tend to think that it is an important trend that needs focused attention.
What do you think? Is cloud computing an overused, over-hyped marketing catch phrase or an important trend?
