Category: News

May 11, 2014 Off

Shifting shape of the cloud benefits users

By David

Grazed from BDLive.  Author: Arthur Goldstuck.

NEXT year it will be 50 years since the Rolling Stones told the world: Hey, you, get off of my cloud. That protest against society being overly ordered would not be out of place today, except it would refer to cloud computing and the privacy challenge it poses to personal data.

The bad news is that we cannot escape the cloud — any time we connect to the internet, make a credit card transaction or use our phones, we are adding to the vast volume of activity-based information being collected and collated somewhere. The concept is generally referred to as “big data”, a buzz phrase that really means we have more data floating about than we had ever imagined possible…

May 11, 2014 Off

Climbing the enterprise cloud market ladder

By David

Grazed from The Next Web.  Author: Sean Jennings.

It’s no secret that most new industries consolidate as they mature, and the enterprise cloud market is no exception. In the last few years, mergers and acquisitions have made headlines as cloud vendors battle it out for a top spot in the relatively new and rapidly growing enterprise cloud market.

According to Gartner, by 2016, most of new IT spending will be in the cloud, so the choice behind cloud acquisition targets will be key for cloud vendors looking to boost their offerings…

May 10, 2014 Off

Rackspace Hosting, Inc. Earnings: Will Price Wars Kill the Cloud Provider?

By David

Grazed from Fool.  Author: Dan Caplinger.

On Monday, Rackspace Hosting (NYSE: RAX  ) will release its quarterly report, and shareholders have seen the stock plunge in response to new competitive pressures. With Google (NASDAQ: GOOG  ) (NASDAQ: GOOGL  ) and Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN  ) among many companies vying for dominance in the cloud-computing arena, Rackspace will have to work harder to cement its place in the industry and keep from getting squeezed out by its rivals.

Rackspace’s business strategy has been to provide premium services for customers looking to take advantage of the power of cloud computing. Yet cost-conscious enterprise customers can be notoriously disloyal when bargains come around, and as Amazon, Google, and other players have recently started a race to the bottom in terms of pricing, Rackspace’s shareholders have started to lose confidence in the company’s ability to compete…

May 10, 2014 Off

Cognition as a Service: Can next-gen creepiness be countered with crowd-sourced ethics?

By David

Grazed from OpEdNews.  Author: David Solomonoff.

Now that marketers use cloud computing to offer everything as a service: infrastructure as a service, platform as a service, and software as a service, what’s left?  Cognitive computing, of course.

Cognition as a service (CaaS) is the next buzzword you’ll be hearing. Going from the top of the stack to directly inside the head, AI in the cloud will power mobile and embedded devices to do things they don’t have the on-board capabilities for, such as speech recognition, image recognition, and natural-language processing (NLP). Apple’s Siri cloud-based voice recognition was one of the first out of the gate but a stampede is joining the fray including Wolfram Alpha, IBM’s Watson, Google Now, and Cortana, as well as newer players like Ginger, ReKognition, and Jetlore…

May 10, 2014 Off

The Dynamic Cloud Needs the Software Defined WAN

By David

Grazed from EnterpriseNetworkingPlanet.  Author: Arthur Cole.

Software defined networking (SDN) is the last step toward creating the fully virtual data center. In the age of the cloud and Big Data, however, a single data center is no longer enough for most organizations.  What they need is a virtual, multisite data ecosystem that can be parsed into very finite instances or harnessed into massive computing environments.  But to do that, the enterprise needs to start pushing SDN over the wide area network (WAN).

The need for the software defined WAN

The subject was front and center at the most recent gathering of the Open Network User Group (ONUG), where, according to IT Connection’s Mike Fratto, the general consensus was that the telecom service provider market has been too slow in the uptake of dynamic WAN connectivity…

May 10, 2014 Off

How government can securely leverage cloud environments

By David

Grazed from GCN.  Author: Dan Chenok.

In recent years, federal agencies have made significant strides incorporating cloud computing into their IT portfolios.  From the OMB “Cloud First” strategy, to GSA’s Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP), the government is following commercial best practices to leverage the cloud.

Cloud capabilities can be provided over the public Internet or through connections over private networks — and government does both. Some agencies establish private clouds due to perceived risks of making data available over public channels. At the same time, they are moving toward greater use of the open Internet, including public clouds.

May 10, 2014 Off

The curious etymology of the cloud computing world

By David

Grazed from LinkedIn.  Author: Alex Tomic.

With HP’s announcement of the release of a new distribution of Openstack called Helion (Ancient Greek ἥλιος hēlios, “sun”), it has become all too obvious that there is either a fascination with the classics in the cloud computing world, or, more likely, we’re simply running out of derivatives of the English word "cloud".

Helion is an interesting departure from the trend of cloud-derived words, presumably because it casts a ray of sunshine on the murky and … cloudy world of cloud computing…

May 10, 2014 Off

Cloud Computing: Are you ready for Internet of Things (IOT) ?

By David

Grazed from 2X.  Autthor: Giorgio Bonuccelli.

The Internet of Things : The 2014 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) held in Las Vegas was dominated by Internet of Things (IOT) and web-connected products. This speaks volumes about the growing popularity of this new innovation. The acquisition of Home automation company, Nest Labs, by Google adds up to researchers belief that IOT is going to revolutionize the network technology in the coming 10 years Though IOT is not new, there is a significant progress in this segment in recent times. As IOT has become an inevitable option for most businesses, it is important for businesses to make the most out of it.

What is Internet of Things?

The Internet of Things or IOT is an entity comprising humans, machines, animals or objects with the ability to communicate with each other using a unique identifier. The embedded technology within these objects enables them to proactively interact with external and internal environments, allowing them to take and implement decisions without requiring human intervention. IOT connects new entities to the internet and when each object is digitalized, you can control it from anywhere…

May 10, 2014 Off

Cloud computing’s elusive TCO

By David

Grazed from GigaOM.  Author: David Linthicum.

Total cost of ownership, or TCO, is a formula that assesses direct and indirect costs and benefits related to the purchase of any IT component. The goal is a final figure that will reflect the true purchase price, all things considered.

For instance, if I leverage a public cloud, my reoccurring costs go up since I now pay subscription usage feeds. However, the amount of money I pay to buy and maintain hardware and software should go down, or go away entirely. Thus, the TCO of cloud is the adjustment in direct and direct costs and benefits as a result of using cloud…

May 10, 2014 Off

6fusion Collaborates on Fourth Annual Future of Cloud Computing Survey

By David

Grazed from 6Fusion.  Author: PR Announcement.

6fusion is pleased to once again be one of the cloud industry leaders collaborating on the 4th annual Future of Cloud Computing Survey and we encourage everyone involved in cloud to participate in the survey. Whether you are a cloud user, cloud provider, cloud broker, or play another role in the cloud you should take the survey. It will only take about 5 minutes to complete and you can access the survey here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/6FusionNB

North Bridge will announce the results at GigaOM Structure, one of the leading cloud industry events that annually convenes influential technology experts to both examine and debate the future of cloud computing. North Bridge partner Michael Skok will present the results of the survey at the show on June 18 in San Francisco. If you are interested in attending, we can offer a 25% discount on tickets to the event. Ping us at info@6fusion.com to get the discount code.