Archive for June, 2010

Experts say we’ll be working primarily in the Cloud in the near future

Many of your employees are already making the shift to the Cloud in their private lives – and the trend is accelerating, according to researchers at Elon University in a recent survey of internet and tech experts.

Is your firm contemplating making the move to the Cloud?  The trend toward the Cloud in personal/consumer computing can only help your firm shift its computer needs to the Cloud, since many on your staff will already be comfortable navigating in the Cloud.

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Newsweek takes to the clouds – or, well, the Cloud

Citing cost-savings as a main driver for their decision, Newsweek magazine stopped hosting its own website recently.  “It saves Newsweek money,” said Geoff Reiss, VP and General Manager of Newsweek Digital. “Lots of people out there built their own infrastructure and are going to be tortured by this idea of sunk costs.”

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Newsweek’s move is indicative of thinking at many companies these days: “Can we save money by pushing applications and platforms to the Cloud?”

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“Surprising” Cloud Stats? We’re not surprised…

Chris Murphy, editor of InformationWeek, blogged that he was “surprised” by the findings appearing in the cover story of his magazine’s most recent issue.  The surprise: 58% of companies surveyed had plans to implement private cloud computing in the near future.

http://www.informationweek.com/blog/main/archives/2010/06/these_private_c.html

The term “private cloud computing” has been described as “the cloud residing behind your firewall” or as emulating the “public cloud” but existing on a private network.  As such, users enjoy, among other benefits, better security and connectivity than that attributed to the public cloud.

In fact, the magazine found, conversely, that close to 2/3 of companies surveyed had no plans to utilize public cloud platforms and applications, primarily because of perceived security risks.

Given the benefits of private cloud computing, we’re not surprised at the positive response companies are giving to it.

Pwn the Cloud

Playing high-profile video games quickly from portable devices such as your iPad might get easier after this week’s Electronic Entertainment Expo, reports CNN.

While the E-3 “game changer” tag has been reserved largely for innovations such as 3-D and motion-sensor systems, several companies hope using cloud computing to store games will be the real shift by letting gamers play high-end titles anywhere, on almost any machine.

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http://www.cnn.com/2010/TECH/gaming.gadgets/06/16/e3.cloud.gaming/index.html?iref=allsearch

Mark Benioff of Salesforce.com on cloud computing: efficient, cost-effective, green

“If Salesforce didn’t exist, just imagine how many servers, disc drives, etc, our 77,000 customers would have to buy,” says Salesforce.com CEO Mark Benioff. “Every small company would need at least one server. Big companies, like the Citibanks of the world, would need several. So, all put together (these companies) would need at least 100,000 servers.” But in its three global data centres, Salesforce has just 3,000 servers, not 100,000. “Just 3 per cent,” says Benioff. “That’s the efficiency of cloud computing.”

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http://business.asiaone.com/Business/Tech%2BSense/Highlights/Story/A1Story20100614-221969.html

Salesforce.com became the world’s first billion dollar cloud computing company in early 2009.

How to know if your firm needs more IT assets – or less

Cloud computing has been described as a “tsunami” that will impact Wall Street and Main Street.  InfoWorld reviews the prediction that many U.S. businesses will embrace cloud computing and eliminate the need to own expensive IT assets.  And the near-term expectation is that 20% of U.S. firms will shift to cloud computing by the end of 2012.  Will one in five companies really kiss their IT assets goodbye in the next two years?

What’s more, will you be among them?

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Dumping IT assets and moving to the cloud

The state of cloud computing – a new study: Is cloud computing secure? Is your firm at risk?

Looking for a heated debate these days?  The security of cloud computing offers just such a debate, argued passionately by highly informed IT professionals supporting the inherent security of cloud computing on one side and those arguing the inherent risk of centralized cloud computing platforms on the other.

Entering the fray is the Ponemon Institute’s study of 900-some IT executives.  Findings include a lack of proactive security evaluation by businesses using cloud computing platforms (no surprise there!) and the inconsistent security measures of various cloud providers (again, no surprise…).

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The state of cloud computing security

What’s a concerned CxO to do?  Recent developments in cloud computing seek to marry the benefits of the cloud with the security, performance, and integrity of your local network.  Intriguing?  Stay tuned!

How You Move a Server to the Cloud

Will the cloud leave footprints on your business?

Increasingly, cloud computing is becoming a resource more business are seeking to harness.  PCMag.com quotes cloud computing expert John Willis: “cloud technology will have a footprint in every business.” Willis even predicts the cloud’s “footprint” will be in every business by 2013.

Check out Willis quote in PCMag here:

The cloud’s footprint

Business leaders and IT professionals alike will decide over the next few years whether the cloud’s footprint looks more like a boot in the pants or a well thought-out strategy.  How can you best leverage the cloud for your business?  Will you pick and choose cloud-based applications?  Perhaps look at private cloud computing – or even beyond that to what’s being called local cloud computing?

Where to free up budget to fund your priorities

The recession just keeps hanging in there.  In good times and bad, C-level managers are always looking for creative ways to allocate funds to meet business needs.  Looking to free up budget committed to IT needs?  The following article attests to the growing use of cloud computing and how it will help firms shift budget normally dedicated for traditional IT assets to other priority uses.  Can firms free up these funds without depleting IT resources or settling for less performance than they have now?

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IT assets disappear as the cloud takes off