How to weigh a cloud
October 27, 2013
Grazed from TheConversation. Author: Sean Cubitt.
Friction-free, weightless, immaterial: the information economy is losing all sense of gravity. The phrase “cloud computing” is completely at home in this floating world. Like little brooks tinkling down the Big Rock Candy Mountain, film streams from the ether onto our screens. Away with clunky VHS tapes, DVDs and Blu-ray discs. Today we can view content (whatever happened to “watching films”?) on any device, from home cinemas to mobile handsets, that’s connected to the cloud. We are showered with plenty from an invisible otherworld of audiovisual refreshment.
Apple’s iTunes started selling video content in 2005, adding iCloud online storage and streaming in 2011. In 2008, five of the six Hollywood film and television majors launched their own Ultraviolet service. This allows consumers to create a “locker” where they store licenses to stream and download content…
Both schemes have big advantages. Studios have much more control over who uses their content and how; they can collect a lot of useful data about clients’ tastes; and the cost of transporting copies is borne by the purchaser…
Read more from the source @ http://theconversation.com/how-to-weigh-a-cloud-19581