My friend Terry’s slightly unorthodox take on cloud computing:
To hell with cloud computing. Clouds are puffy crap that float lazily by. Is that what you want out of your service provider? Just floating by without a care in the world?
It is time for tornado computing. Or hurricane computing. Real wrath of God type stuff. I want an architecture that knocks me off my feet, whips my apps around and hurls them half way through a tree. I don’t want my data intact for some script kiddie to steal. I want it like a frog in a blender; unrecognizably processed with a taste only I care for.
So to that end I am setting half of my air handlers to “Freakin’ Steaming,” the other half to “Ice Storm,” and locking the doors until the screaming stops. By this time tomorrow you should have some form of cloud computing in the data center, maybe a squall somewhere over the mainframe if you’re lucky. Viva La Revolucion!
Interestingly enough, that pretty much sums up my feelings, too. Service providers don’t seem to address the DR, legal, privacy, and security concerns that corporations have, don’t seem to care, and even go so far as a Microsoft rep telling a coworker of mine that “it’s no big deal as every bit of information about you is practically out there already.” Given that sort of attitude how can I do anything but build my own cloud?
Amen. I personally hate this buzzword “Cloud Computing.” I cringe every time I hear it mentioned on CNET News (almost daily). I think the thing that ticks me off most is the fact that these stories make everyone believe that the “Cloud” is some imaginary area in where computing just happens–as if by magic. Have some data and want an application? Just throw it in the cloud!! I’m with you, build your own cloud, and make it one big storm.