Grazed from Computer Technology Review.  Author: Andrew L. Goldstein.

A study reported earlier this year that 37 percent of all organizations worldwide are deploying cloud computing solutions, and predicted that by 2014, businesses in the U.S. will spend more than $13 billion on cloud computing, a 400 percent increase from today. Many companies are considering moving to cloud service providers that offer access to software applications on a SaaS basis, and many software companies are moving to cloud hosted environments as a means to offer their programs. Cloud computing, however, raises new and challenging legal issues for both cloud computing users and vendors…

Grazed from FederalNewsRadio.com.   Author: Editorial Staff.

As more agencies move to the cloud, the list of best — and worst — practices is getting longer and more sophisticated.

Yogesh Khanna, the chief technology officer of CSC’s North American Public Sector, has compiled his list of top 10 lessons learned…

Grazed from Wired.  Author: Matt Rodkey.

Cloud computing is a transformational model for delivering IT Services.  Replacing the rigid boundaries of traditional IT infrastructure with the elasticity of the cloud give businesses the agility to quickly react to rapid changes in demand and better serve their customers.  Cloud computing is fundamentally different from traditional IT infrastructure because of the flexibility.  In some sense, traditional IT infrastructure is fairly static.  Increasing capacity in response to anticipated requirements typically means provisioning new OS instances or allocating hardware resources in a slightly different fashion.  This is entirely feasible, but is a slow process to avoid disruptions…

Grazed from MarketWatch.  Author: PR Announcement.

Salesforce.com, the enterprise cloud computing company ( http://www.salesforce.com/cloudcomputing/ ), today announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Model Metrics, a mobile and social cloud consulting services company. With Model Metrics, salesforce.com will add mobile and social expertise, allowing the company to further transform customers and empower its global partner ecosystem. The transaction is expected to close in salesforce.com’s fiscal fourth quarter ending Jan. 31, 2012, subject to customary closing conditions…

Grazed from Dark Reading.  Author: Editorial Staff.

While malware attacks continue to be a significant risk and operational cost driver, today’s IT security teams are more concerned about threats brought on by their organization’s reliance on personal mobile devices, virtualization technologies and cloud computing, according to the State of the Endpoint, a new Ponemon Institute study commissioned by Lumension’, the global leader in endpoint management and security. While IT’s focus on the enablement of business productivity is a mind shift expected by other business leaders, inadequate collaboration and lacking resources for security create a perfect storm for hackers to capitalize on…

Grazed from IT Business Edge.  Author: Ann All.

Cloud computing has long been seen as a slam-dunk for small companies. As IT Business Edge’s Paul Mah wrote in September: "Given the many inherent disadvantages faced by fledgling small businesses or mid-sized businesses, the ability to tap into virtually limitless computational resources without having to commit a single dime of capital expenditure does carry a strong appeal indeed."…

Grazed from ZDNet.  Author: James Staten.

Grazed from MarketWatch.  Author:  PR Announcement.

Convey Computer announced today it is partnering with HPC cloud innovator, Nimbix, to deliver Convey’s unique hybrid-core architecture and bioinformatics personalities as a cloud-based HPC solution. Nimbix, a new Convey customer, will deploy hybrid-core systems to accelerate informatics and discovery applications…

Grazed from VentureBeat.  Author: Sean Ludwig.

Anyone who who follows technology trends has undoubtedly heard the term “cloud service” thrown around few gazillion times the past few months. But if you don’t know the difference between terms such as PaaS, IaaS and SaaS, don’t fret — you’re far from alone…