Cloud service providers have done a great job hyping the concept of cloud computing -- so much so that many Americans think cloud computing is important, even though they don't know what it is.
At the same time, cloud marketers and corporate IT had best get busy explaining the facts about clouds to users, because many would-be enterprise customers are also following the herd when it comes to negative beliefs about cloud services.
In a survey of 1,000 American adults, just 16 percent associated the term cloud computing with what it actually is -- in the survey's words, "a computer network to store, access, and share data from Internet-connected devices."
The rest of the respondents really can't say what cloud computing is -- to the point that a full 51 percent of respondents believe severe weather would interfere with their use of cloud services.
At the same time, though, 68 percent of those surveyed believe the cloud has economic benefits.
Many users who don't understand the term have lied about their ignorance, often at work. Here's how Citrix's public statement puts it:
One in five Americans (22 percent) admit that they've pretended to know what the cloud is or how it works. Some of the false claims take place during work hours, with one third of these respondents faking an understanding of the cloud in the office and another 14 percent doing so during a job interview.
But one of the most interesting findings was that even though 54 percent of those surveyed claim not to be using clouds, 95 percent of that segment actually are using these services for online shopping and banking, social networking, photo storage, and file sharing.
Less humorous is the fact that the same group, despite being ignorant of their use of clouds, claims to have reservations about cost (34 percent), security (32 percent), and privacy (31 percent).
Source: Citrix and Wakefield Research.
All this has a couple of potential enterprise implications. First, marketers need to go beyond just making cloud computing a catchy term with positive connotations. And IT must do its part to educate users about the realities of the technology.
Unless vendors and enterprises start taking these steps, adoption of clouds could be stalled by ignorance or fear, despite the unprecedented vendor coup that has already added the term cloud computing to most Americans' vocabularies -- even if they don't know what they're talking about.
Well, I still believe that users who are lying about their knowledge of cloud services at work are doing so because someone is bringing up the topic there. And if that is the case, then those users have a say in the adoption of the service.
If there are any distinctions, they are distinctions of 1) which particular parties have undesirable access to one's data, and 2) what those parties have to do to get the data.
Security matters not a whit if the data aren't private, and privacy only gets one so far if the data are insecure. Distinctions, sure, but from a practical standpoint, we are, to a great extent, talking about the same thing.
In other words: If it's not secure, it's not very private, and if it's not private, it's not very secure.
Actually, I see a distinction here, Joe. Facebook may be secure, for instance, but it can trip users up on their privacy. Corporate information, likewise, can be secure, but it may not be properly protected from otherwise legal breaches. (Cuef social engineering.)
Aren't "security concerns" and "privacy concerns" rather the same thing, when it comes right down to it? If something is secure, it is private, and vice versa. If something is not secure, it is not private, and vice versa.
That's true to a certain extent but I still hold the view that many of them are not in a decision making position to influence the wide adoption of cloud based services. How often times have we used services and still can't even describe them in detail when asked about them? You can see this from the inconsistencies of the answers giving by the respondents.
These people are all users and many of them are lying about cloud computing at work. That means that in some instances they aren't going to know what cloud computing is when it comes time to suggest its purchase, request its wider adoption, or speak out against it.
"Unless vendors and enterprises start taking these steps, adoption of clouds could be stalled by ignorance or fear, despite the unprecedented vendor coup that has already added the term cloud computing to most Americans' vocabularies -- even if they don't know what they're talking about."
I don't seehow this survey can be linked to cloud adoption. The adults who took part in the survey are not enterprise executives. They don't necesarily make decisions as to whether ornot to adopt cloud computing. The fact that they are using cloud based services and still are ignorant about it shows that they have very minimal or no influence as far as adopting cloud based services is concern.
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