Happy union: Knowledge Management and the cloud?

Grazed from KMWorld. Author: Stephen E. Arnold.

Cloud computing and big data appear to be a new technology marriage made in heaven. For many organizations, the cloud and big data could crack the knowledge management problem. In 2011, the National Institute for Science & Technology (NIST) published a draft definition of cloud computing. The definition articulated several "essential characteristics," service models and deployment models.

The main idea is that most enterprise applications can run in a time-sharing setup with such bells and whistles as collaboration, reports and guaranteed uptime. On-premises systems—despite their security advantages—require specialized staff. To control costs and shift from the hard-to-control expense of on-premise systems, cloud computing offers a managed solution. If the costs are about the same or higher, the efficiencies of outsourcing appear to make sense to many organizations…

Big data is a comparatively new challenge for organizations. The data may be growing, but the fuel igniting the big data booster rocket is management’s awareness that information has value. With more digital information available, senior managers are reasoning that digital information must be processed to yield nuggets, information about trends and insights into what prompts customers to buy a company’s products. Big data, therefore, is an enterprise information priority. Infrastructure, software license fees, data scientists and capital costs are expensive to deploy in an on-premises model. Cloud computing offers a path forward. Amazon, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Microsoft and dozens upon dozens of other online service providers are in the cloud game…

Read more from the source @ http://www.kmworld.com/Articles/News/News-Analysis/Happy-union-KM-and-the-cloud-95369.aspx

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