Does MS even know what the "cloud" is?

[Fred Sherman]

RDP is not cloud computing. Neither is image editing. MS couldn't find its ass with both hands in a room full of mirrors if you spotted them the left cheek.

 

[Jake Bunce]

It's best not to argue about the definition of cloud computing. That battle is already lost. Fortunately the "cloud" label is completely meaningless no matter what your definition. You don't need to use the "cloud" label to describe a service.

Interesting thing about "the cloud." There are definitions spanning everything internet-related, all of which are relabellings of old technology. But of those limitless definitions, the one definition that is most commonly acknowledged is the idea of virtualized resources which is also a relabelling of old technology. So why not just name a service for what it is?

The "cloud" label has no real descriptive power. On the contrary, the "cloud" label is more often used to be nondescript:

http://xenforo.com/community/threads/cloud-syncronization.3352/#post-50744

Most disturbing for me is the way the term has come to be used to describe ignorance. It is as if any resource on the internet for which you don't have detailed technical information is in the cloud. The resource is probably just a white box server on a shelf somewhere but you don't know that so it's in the cloud.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html

“Cloud Computing”

The term “cloud computing” is a marketing buzzword with no clear meaning. It is used for a range of different activities whose only common characteristic is that they use the Internet for something beyond transmitting files. Thus, the term is a nexus of confusion. If you base your thinking on it, your thinking will be vague.

When thinking about or responding to a statement someone else has made using this term, the first step is to clarify the topic. Which kind of activity is the statement really about, and what is a good, clear term for that activity? Once the topic is clear, the discussion can head for a useful conclusion.

Curiously, Larry Ellison, a proprietary software developer, also noted the vacuity of the term “cloud computing.” He decided to use the term anyway because, as a proprietary software developer, he isn't motivated by the same ideals as we are.

 

[Jerry]

Having had a brief foray into the "social gaming" world ..... i.e. old school games people churning out tosh on Facebook & thinking they are inventing : the internet, friends list, anything to do with interaction online ........ coming from the internet world and seeing them turn up, always made me giggle ......... I've never come across such a misused and full of BS term as cloud.

A new company that I'm going to be working with was giving a talk on their buisness here in Vancouver, and were asked by someone in the crowed :

Oh you're pushing 200 million hits and 45+ million users a month, can you explain how you have really leveraged the cloud

We haven't, what's the point ........ we have 4 servers, and we know how to use them properly

As technical director for one of the games companies I was being forced to talk to various "cloud companies" by the boss as he'd been convinced by their sales people that you can't scale-the-internet without it.

I'll take performance engineering and using what you have properly - over throwing a lot of money at nothing more than a managed server installer.

Ignorance annoys me ........ and preying on it in others really annoys me, it reminds me of the 1980 sales tactics of IBM et al.

 

[Ace]

They're marketing it to consumers too now?

http://office365.microsoft.com/ is what we're gearing up for.

 

[grant sarver]

New term for "smoke and mirrors"?

 

[grant sarver]

I think Microsoft is just trying to relabel the "software as a service" concept they were promoting a few years ago.

 

[CTXMedia]

In a year's time, ask someone you know if they've heard of "Remotely hosted applications" or "Software as a service" and I expect they won't have. "The cloud?", "Oh sure, everyone's heard about the cloud. We use it all the time!" ...

 

[grant sarver]

In a year's time, ask someone you know if they've heard of "Remotely hosted applications" or "Software as a service" and I expect they won't have. "The cloud?", "Oh sure, everyone's heard about the cloud. We use it all the time!" ...

Yeah, I think I understand it. Just seems like MS is using it as a buzz word and confusing it's meaning.