so what is the cloud anyway?
Big brain geeks and IT professionals all over the world keep on debating exactly what cloud computing and ‘the cloud’ actually are. To me it seems what you think the cloud is depends on what you’re trying to do. Here’s just a few, you can Google for others:
- The academic description.
- A much simpler description – only the first bullet applies
- A euphemism for the internet
If you want to geek out try Nati Shalom’s post.
So which is it?
It’s all of the above. But as far as we’re concerned here the cloud is online software that replaces programs installed on your hard drive, available for free to consumers or for a low pay as you go price. The idea is to replace bloated programs like Microsoft Office, OpenOffice, Outlook, Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, GIMP, Money, or Quicken that require huge hard drives and ever growing processors. It’s services that let you replace local hard drive storage and data backup with online storage and file management services. It’s completing tasks like shopping – for books, movies, music, appliances (large and small) electronics, travel, even cars and groceries. It’s scheduling appointments, tracking your kids, educating yourself or your family, keeping in touch, earning some income, finding a job, or finding your high school sweetheart.
The cloud is the internet, used to entertain yourself, organize your shedule, communicate with anyone, save yourself time, improve your quality of life, and save yourself money. My definition cuts across all the geekspeak you can find earlier in this post. I don’t want to debate the cloud, I want to use it. I’ll use my worktime to argue the technical points. I’m at home and I want to relax, with my head in the cloud.
