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This is a short story about the 7 secrets of Cloud Computing.
The whole story was told to me by somebody who I trust and highly respect in this field, but he wishes to remain anonymous. He has been in this industry for more than two decades and has played with all major providers at some point in time. So I think his knowledge is pretty solid, so let us dive right into it…
Imagine my surprise when I found out there is more than meets the eye with Cloud computing….here are 7 secrets that will never see the light of day:
1) The whole idea behind Cloud computing sounds great but in reality, it doesn’t work the way we were told:
As I said before, we love to hear things that make sense and Cloud Computing is something that everybody can relate with. The idea of dynamically scaling resources up and down is pretty neat and appears to be a good fit for most businesses out there. Big companies don’t want to overpay when they don’t need all those resources 24/7. And small companies that are just starting out wouldn’t have a big demand for computing power either….so that’s where Cloud Computing comes into play. It’s a perfect match between what customers need and what vendors offer…at least in theory.
2) The Cloud computing “shifting-the-pea” game:
Everywhere around the globe companies such as Amazon and Google are offering pretty cheap services for companies that want to move into cloud computing. They offer all kinds of tools that make it really easy for people to try out their service with little cost attached. And who wouldn’t want to save money? It looks like a win-win situation on every level except one…it’s not totally free and there is a catch.
3) The Cloud computing “elephant in the room”:
Wherever I go people talk about cloud computing like it’s already here but there is one problem with this idea: There is no way to get any meaningful ROI on something like this yet which makes sense if you think about it. You can’t use Cloud Computing unless all your resources are virtualized in some way or another which is not where most businesses are at this moment in time. My partner told me that if you were to poll any CIO asking them about their data center the majority of them would say it’s not virtualized at all….you could probably count those who responded yes with one hand…
4) The Cloud Computing “shiny-thing” syndrome:
Everywhere around the globe people are talking about Cloud Computing and how great it is but nobody ever stops for a minute to actually think about what they are saying because there seems to be something more fun to talk about instead. Doesn’t this sound familiar? Haven’t we heard these same kinds of stories before? Back in 1999, I remember the whole dot com revolution thing, everybody was talking about the Internet and how it would change everything forever…I remember asking my ISP to give me a static IP number so I could have a personal website. Everybody talked about this shiny thing called “the Internet” but nobody ever stopped long enough to actually think about what they were saying because there was this really cool new thing to talk about instead.
5) The Cloud Computing “we-are-not-so-different” syndrome:
Everywhere around the globe people are talking about Cloud Computing and how great it is but when you listen closer, most of them sound exactly alike…why is that? Doesn’t it seem like everybody is saying basically the same thing? This reminds me of back in 1999 when all these crazy ideas were floating around about the Internet and how it would change everything forever. Back then I remember hearing some people say that we need to change marketing because now companies can sell directly to their customers…I thought these people were crazy but not long after they said this, Amazon showed up and changed the way we shop online forever. Doesn’t this sound familiar?
6) The Cloud Computing “trust-me” syndrome:
Everywhere around the globe, there is lots of talk about Cloud Computing and how great it is without ever explaining who actually does what in such a magical place as the cloud. People just kept telling me “Yeah Cloud Computing works like magic!” Seriously….what? Magic? Nobody wants to admit that they don’t know exactly how everything is working and that they need to trust somebody else with their data. The whole idea of trusting a complete stranger who is located in some physical location we don’t know much about and sending our data into this person’s hands just doesn’t sound sane at all…does it?
7) The Cloud Computing “giving-people-a-fish” syndrome:
Everywhere around the globe, everybody is talking about how beneficial Cloud Computing will be for everyone without ever explaining what you can do with such a great thing as the cloud which sounds strangely familiar…Why is everybody giving me this fish? I mean come on, if I want to eat then give me something useful like a fishing pole or an oven instead of just handing out raw fish….right?
Conclusion:
I used to think that I was the only guy in the world who didn’t see any benefit for this Cloud Computing thing, especially after all the rave reviews coming from everywhere around me. This made me wonder how something like this caught on so much in such a short period of time when it’s actually not that different from what we already have right now.
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