but I do have one question, how can I guarantee alternative or redundant routes to a sever? For example if I have a CRM service over a handheld app, what ahppens if my cloud provider goes down like over the weekend?
I wish you could do the webinars during the middle of the week, we are here in the middle east facing a problem with both the timing and the days you choose.
@Kim Davis I agree that it is wise to know all about the organization's IT application portfolio, the data these applications use and such to be able to protect them properly. Most don't really know what they're running, where it is running, what data is being produced, etc.
@django1 that all depends upon where the data is, how it is protected and how it is accessed. In some cases, a cloud provider has better security practices than do some of their cutomers. It's always wise to learn what YOUR supplier does before signing up.
Ts & Cs are neither good nor bad. They are simply the rules of that supplier's road. If they aren't acceptable, the wise consumer chooses a different road and a different supplier.
Google, Microsoft, HP, IBM, Apple and every other supplier want to offer the best, the most customer acceptable service. They also want to protect themselves.
The Ts and Cs are often written to protect the supplier not the customer.
If disaster recovery and business continuity strategies require that redundant copies are spread out "throughout the world", the more risks exposure you will have i.e. stealing your data
@Kim Davis Who is responsible for security is something that needs to be fully understood before buying a service offering. Some suppliers will step forward and take responsiblity. Others will point to their contract language and say that it is the customer's problem.
Although Ts and Cs are boring and often writen in "legalese" they are very , very important. Who owns the data, who has access to the data, whether or not service levels are guarenteed, etc. are often spelled out there. If someone doesn't read them and is later disappointed with their experience, whose problem is that? The supplier? Google is a really good example of a supplier whose Ts & Cs should be required reading. Microsoft also.
@django1 Service providers are starting to offer datacenters in different places around the world and make it possible to choose where a specific server or workload will be housed. This also makes it possible for a customer to use different data centers so the failure of one won't put them out of business.
The folks having the knowledge of IT products, the expertise to put it to work, and the disastifaction with the staus quo could be considered the "wolves." The "sheep" are those who just use technology and don't care to understand it all that deeply. Companies, for example, could offer bonuses or promotions to those who find better ways of doing things and then publicize the winners broadly. This ony works if IT doesn't equate users with losers.
This is a thorny and difficult issue. The only way to prevent people bringing in their own equipment or signing up with their own service company is to create a very restrictive environment. Organizations have not been able to really lock things down completely. Successful companies have found ways to discover the "wolves" living out with the "Sheep" and then incent them to protect the sheep. I guess this means that IT and finanance will have to look for the teltale signes of cloud usage and only pay for things that they authorized.
@Mitch I know of a case from the late 1970s in which a set of Doctors used the services of a service provider. Later when they wanted to bring their computing in-house, the service provider claimed ownership of all of their data. It took an expensive court battle to straighten it out. In the end, the service provider was allowed to keep a copy of the Doctors' data.
This has been part of the emgence of nearly every technology I've followed. IT is charted to keep things running, keep things safe and end users often find that to restrictive. So, they go out, acquire the newest, most exciting technology, and bring it to the office. It is always challenging to maintain security, performance, reliability, etc. standards in that environment. In one generation is was departments buying their own minicomputers. In another, people would bring in their own PCs. Now we're looking at people bringing in their own smartphones, tablets, and using personal accounts at cloud service companies.
Dan, I think an enterprise needs to have lawyers involved who know about compliance and regulatory issues before it moves key data to the cloud. Am I right?
@mgriswold Data ownership and governance is one of the key challenges to cloud adoption. Many suppliers are working to offer tools and services to address those issues. I don't think a perfect solution has appeared yet.
@Daniel, Whats your take on the govt's assertion (related to the Megaupload/Kim Dotcom case) that data stored in the cloud is not yours and therefore not subject to the normal protections. If that proves to be true, would be a huge detriment to cloud computing
Microsoft wasn't the first and won't be the last to use this approach. As long as there have been attempts to create industry and international standards, there have been efforts to turn them to a single supplier's purposes.
Am I right in thinking that enterprises are reluctant to migrate critical systems to public clouds, but might well be happy hosting them in private clouds?
Cloud computing, like other IT trends, is based upon trying to address customers issues. As long as the issues remain, the industry is going to try to address them. Cloud computing is a good example. It is based upon a long history of trying to reduce the cost and complexity of IT operations. It will be helpful to some and others would be best served by doing things themselves.
The national institute of standards has done a fine job of sketching out the basic cloud computing framework. Suppliers, of course, want to put their own spin on things and so, NIST's standards aren't the end of the road.
@Dan, you made the comment that the could might be something to read about and not implement. is that becoming a growing voice, now that the oooh and aaaah of cloud is starting to disapate?
A good example of this was X.25 communications. There were so many options that it was possible for two suppliers to be totally complient and produce totally incompatible offerings.
Here's my forst question for Dan: You talked during slide nine about the extent to which companies are using the cloud for extra capacity or nonstrategic applications. Do you see companies leaving their core applications in-house?
RE: fights over standards. Each supplier wants to create a stong competitive position. While each will say they're interested in standards, they are also trying to find a way to hold onto customers. This means each wants to bend the standards process to their own ends. This makes it hard to come to agreement on anything.
@Mitch, repost: There is really a gray line between platform-as-a-service and infrastructure-as-a-service, so I keep reminding myself by googleing it. It helps!
Platform, you can deploy your own software in the cloud, but don't manage networks, servers, operating systems, or storage. Infrastructure you do (obviously not for the whole cloud, but your part of it).
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If they are using a Cloud Application for this broadcast, then it is not a very good example of why we should be using apps in the Cloud...just sayin'..... :)
As of last night the situation in Staten Island still seemed very dire. I haven't checked the news today. A friend is still trying to get in touch with a friend on the Jersey Shore and can't get through.
I was just talking to a co-worker at lunch and we're hoping they don't decide to delay the New York Marathon. The important thing is to take care of ALL folks effected by Super Storm Sandy.
GeorgiaCougar - The Newark Star-Ledger says no non-union crews have been turned away. http://www.nj.com/news/index.ssf/2012/11/non-union_utility_crews_welcom.html
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Social media has been with us for a decade -- but employer policies and the law are anything but firm about the most appropriate usage of this powerful tool.
Businesses often struggle to decide which domain to use. When it comes to purchasing a domain name, you have plenty of extensions to choose from, ranging from .com and .net, to .me, and even .mobi. But which one should you pick?
I've been writing about how the next evolution of the Internet might just be an advertising revolution, and how corporate IT can stay involved as the enablers and providers of the technologies that make this possible.
In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
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M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
M2M: Rise of the Machines? Not Yet David Weldon In the 1970 science fiction thriller Colossus: The Forbin Project, two giant supercomputers from the United States and Soviet Union secretly join forces to take control of the collective nuclear might of the two countries. In the film, the two machines discover each other's existence, communicate back-and-forth, share their collective data, and cut their human creators out of the process. It is the ultimate example of machine-to-machine communications, or M2M. CLICK FOR MORE
