It’s interesting to see Microsoft jumping on the cloud band wagon recently with Azure a cloud version of Windows. It seems that a lot of the major players are now looking to follow the Google route of trying to get their applications and document storage on-line . Apple with it’s “Mobile Me” that takes email, contacts, diary etc and allows you to access them from any where.
Google with numerous tools that link photography, documents, email.
Adobe now has a version of Photoshop up there and there are now even video editing tools available from companies like Jumpcut.
Even Amazon are in on the great migration to move into the cloud with the development of some of their services like S3 and hosting. All very well and good but there are a couple of things that make me a little nervous.
I am a big user of these types of services and there are couple of things that concern me. The first is what happens if I accidentally break the “rules” or am even just reported for breaking the rules? My account and all my connections and tools get “killed” or at least suspended until I can contact someone. Given there are never any “old school” phone numbers to call and the chances are that your integrated email also gets suspended then this could be a problem. The second is what happens to the usability, lag and service when the system gets stretched? As more data is transferred over the Internet and the growth of video content this is inevitable.
The idea of cloud where we can all store oodles of data forever and access it from any where at any time is a very seductive proposition, but if you or your business is depending on this type of integrated on-line connection then there could be some major problems brewing for the future.
With the potential of an Exaflood on the horizon there are more and more conversations about prioritizing data packets over the networks and charging for the privilege (Net Neutrality).
I have heard both the UK government and the newly elected President Obama US claim that they are not in favour of this but if the infrastructure can not be put in place fast enough and bandwidth usage continues at its current rate then they may not have any option and our nice, friendly, useful cloud may have some shocks in store for us all.
Filed under: Marketing, Opinion, Technology, Amazon, Apple, Exaflood, Google, Microsoft, Net Neutrality, Obama
