Grazed from TechCrunch. Author: Ron Miller.

Amazon Web Services better watch its back. And while we’re at it, let’s issue a warning to Microsoft and Google and just about any cloud service you can think of, because there is a new player in town and they have a lot going for them including being based in China and oh, getting a record-setting IPO last Friday that resulted in raising a whopping $25B.

That kind of money gives you some serious clout, and let’s face it even before the IPO, Alibaba was beginning to flex its considerable muscles. We already know Alibaba is a big player in Chinese online shopping and we know it has set its sights on cloud computing. Just recently it opened up its fifth data center, this one in Shenzhen. Heck, it’s even got its fingers in banking. With $25B in additional funds, it can do just about whatever it wants…

Grazed from PRNewsWire.  Author: PR Announcement.

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) will release two new International Standards for cloud computing in the coming weeks:

• ISO/IEC 17788, Cloud Computing – Overview and Vocabulary
• ISO/IEC 17789, Cloud Computing – Reference Architecture

These standards were developed as a collaborative project between JTC 1 – ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee 1, Information Technology – and ITU-T – the International Telecommunication Union’s Telecommunication Standardization Sector…

Grazed from ZDNet. Author: Joe McKendrick.

Is the physical data center an anachronism? Some industry leaders say there’s no longer a need for enterprises to have data centers at all — that everything they need is in the cloud. That’s the word from Matthew Finnie, CTO of Interoute, and a regular advisor to the European Commission on ICT research and innovation. In an interview conducted by TechRadar’s Desire Athow, Finnie says cloud computing is more than adequately filling the need data centers once fulfilled.

Of course, the "cloud" is not operating in a vacuum — it’s powered by multiple data centers. But Finnie’s point is that enterprises should not worry about all that underlying infrastructure. While Finnie’s business is running virtual data centers for clients, it’s interesting to get his take on how these opportunities are unfolding:…

Read more from the source @ http://www.zdnet.com/physical-data-centers-how-quaint-7000033941/

Grazed from TechTarget. Author: David Linthicum.

Cloud computing experts were called to arms following the iCloud hack that spurred an outcry regarding cloud security. Mainstream reporters sought out anyone with the ability to spell "cloud computing" for their hot take on the hack that publicized personal photos of mostly female celebrities. Most major news outlets across the globe are covering the security breach and, of course, questioning the safety of cloud computing against hacker attacks.

What’s interesting is the cloud case of perception versus reality. This was an attack on Apple’s iCloud, not through some major flaw in the security system. Many hackers likely researched publicly available personal information for these celebrities and figured out their user IDs and passwords. The cloud did not fail these victims — people did…

Read more from the source @ http://searchcloudcomputing.techtarget.com/tip/Public-clouds-reputation-fends-off-cloud-hacker-attacks

Grazed from ITBusinessEdge. Author: Arthur Cole.

The initial rush to embrace the cloud is over, and it seems the enterprise is finally taking a more thoughtful, reasoned approach to the new technology. But this still has many CIOs wondering: How do I craft a successful cloud strategy? And perhaps even more crucial, how do I ensure my cloud strategy won’t end in utter failure?

At its most basic level, the cloud is simply another piece of the enterprise infrastructure. In that vein, things like deployment, integration, ROI and TCO all come into play, although the calculations are different given the unusual price points and CAPEX/OPEX contrasts with standard servers, storage and other hardware-centric platforms…

Grazed from GuruFocus. Author: Editorial Staff.

The recent Apple (AAPL) iCloud accident has raised a lot of storm not only against Apple as the service provider but against the whole cloud system. Today on every media and web portal, people have voiced their concerns and anger against what happened on the iCloud and how they are now shying away from putting their data on the cloud. People have gone to the extent of terming the cloud as a big technical bubble that has now burst, and it’s time to lay the cloud under its tombstone.

This reminds me of the first massive motor car accident dating back to somewhere between 1908 when Henry Ford rolled out the first motor car, and 1970 when seatbelts came into existence. Henry Ford rolled out Model T cars from his assembly line in 1908; until then there hadn’t been any automobile fatality in nearly 40 years prior to that – not since Mary Ward was run over by a steam-powered car in Ireland in 1869…

Grazed from TopTechNews. Author: Jennifer LeClaire.

Is EMC selling itself? The data Relevant Products/Services storage products maker might be, if you believe the rumor mill. The Wall Street Journal first broke the story about a potential merger and other options, citing pressure from a shareholder activist and the retirement of its CEO Joseph Tucci sometime early in 2015.

In fact, the Journal reports that EMC has been in talks with Hewlett-Packard (HP) for nearly a year about a potential tie up. Those talks recently ended, but discussions are reportedly underway with Dell, Cisco Relevant Products/Services and Oracle, the paper reported. It’s unclear if EMC would be sold as an entire unit or broken up into parts and lose its brand identity altogether…

Grazed from ITBusinessEdge. Author: Michael Vizard.

Cloud computing represents something of a fundamental shift in how IT is deployed and managed. Given that, it only stands to reason that new approaches to securing IT in the age of the cloud are also going to be required. That’s the thinking that went into the development of a new cloud application security gateway from FireLayers that, as software running on a third-party data center, is designed to support any cloud computing environment.

FireLayers CEO Yair Grindlinger says rather than relying on traditional firewalls to secure cloud applications, the FireLayers Cloud Application Security Gateway allows IT organizations to make use of a service that eliminates the need to route every request to access an application through an appliance installed on their premises…

Grazed from Forbes. Author: Editorial Staff.

Cisco recently announced its intent to acquire private cloud provider Metacloud, in an effort to bolster its global Intercloud platform and architecture. Metacloud provides private cloud solutions to organisations with its OpenStack-as-a-service model, delivering ready-to-use private clouds in clients’ data centers. The deal is expected to close by the end of the ongoing quarter (Q1 FY2015) and upon completion of the acquisition, Metacloud’s employees will join Cisco’s Cloud Infrastructure and Managed Services business division.

Cisco’s Cloud Services architecture is also based on OpenStack open source software and is designed to help customers to easily and securely use data across both private and public clouds. The acquisition is likely to provide a boost to Cisco’s plans to build the world’s largest Intercloud, which is a secure network of globally distributed and remotely managed clouds capable of meeting growing customer needs, especially as part of the Internet of Everything (IoE)…

Read more from the source @ http://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2014/09/22/cisco-expands-intercloud-architecture-with-metacloud-acquisition/

Grazed from InformationWeek. Author: Elena Malykhina.

The federal government is known for its risk-adverse nature and tight control of IT assets. But with increasing data needs and constrained budgets, agencies are turning to cloud computing as a solution. Policies such as Cloud First have moved agencies in the right direction. Cloud First, authored by former federal CIO Vivek Kundra, mandates that agencies consider cloud computing before other options for new IT projects.

In an interview with InformationWeek Government earlier this year, Kundra, who is now with Salesforce as executive VP of emerging markets, said the public sector is experiencing a major shift in the IT landscape. "We’ve seen amazing proof points when it comes to cloud computing, like the $600 million contract that Amazon won with the CIA," he said…

Read more from the source @ http://www.informationweek.com/government/cloud-computing/5-early-cloud-adopters-in-federal-government/d/d-id/1315911