by John Russell Turner
"The Cloud" (jargon)
literally, the Internet; when used in the phrase "cloud computing" refers to the practice of storing data, software, and other forms of information off-site, usually on a remote computer not controlled by the user.
OVER THE YEARS, I HAVE LEARNED A RULE OF THUMB: if I hear an actor in a commercial casually use a jargon word I've never heard of, as if
everyone knows what the word means, I look the word up. One such word I've heard recently is "the cloud", as in "I uploaded all of my photos to the cloud", or "we've decided to move all our IT resources to the cloud", etc. One of my software instructors made a casual mention of this piece of jargon; again, as if the word would be immediately recognized: "Windows 7 was made with The Cloud in mind". The computer world is filled with jargon, and if you don't recognize a word or use of a word, then, why, you're obviously behind the times. At least that's the impression I get. It's funny how the computing world is so similar to the fashion/clothing world. Anyway, I'm just sayin'.
SO I LOOKED IT UP. Know what I found? The "cloud" equals the "Internet". The two words mean exactly the same thing.
AND I ALSO FOUND that many people are already using the "cloud" in order to share storage space, software, hardware and the like. In fact, they've been doing so for the past 10-15 years. Whenever you store your digital pictures at a site like Picasa, Flickr, PhotoBucket, et al, you are using "cloud computing".
Here is what Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has to say about it. Ellison is a bit shrill, and has an obvious bias against Microsoft, but he makes a good point. He asks "what the hell is cloud computing?"
Richard Stallman, the founder of GNU, puts it more succinctly; he raises the issue not only of privacy, but of ultimate ownership of your data. There are other critics of cloud computing out there, but my point is this:
if people have been outsourcing their IT needs for about a decade and a half now, this new "cloud computing" push by Google and Microsoft is nothing more than marketing hype, which is inherently misleading.
And you know, it makes me wonder: since the essence of cloud computing is off site storage of data, could this not be a precursor to...gasp! gulp!...government controls over the Internet? If your data and software are not in your physical possession (i.e., on your laptop, thumb drive, PC), then how much control do you really have? If people go along with this push towards cloud computing, they'll (of course) turn to the law (and hence, politicians) to protect their stuff. These laws will insure that the consumer has recourse in the case of disputes. There will also be regulation and various rules to follow-and that means that the government will grow, and so will everyone's tax burden. It's anyone's guess how this will ultimately affect the Internet, but I can imagine that it will be vastly different than it is now. Would not this be a convenient precedent for lawmakers to regulate
all the aspects of the Internet, including the free exchange of ideas?
In conclusion, I advise caution. The marketing whizzes at Microsoft, Google, et al are trying very hard to make what we've been having for years suddenly seem
so very sexy.
