The Teckki Says

What is Cloud Computing?

If you have a public email account, understanding Cloud Computing is low pressure, because your emails, pictures and other information are stored in the Cloud Computing stratosphere. This, and your ability to access your account, is the basic gist of Cloud Computing. Google takes this a step further, allowing you to store documents and spreadsheets online.

Given this, many of you already trust the Cloud.

But some of you may have been introduced to a hail of issues in Cloud Computing if you owned a T-Mobile Sidekick and weren't able to restore your phone information from a backup after your battery went dead. In that instance, you understood it all too well - you got drenched.

Storms do occur in Cloud Computing, and there can be serious consequences.

In the future, I suspect that you will be flooded with marketing from companies touting Cloud Computing, sunny scenarios and all. Cloud Computing is relatively safe, considering that you've trusted your websites to such technology for years. However, are you ready to jet stream ahead and trust more of your company data and functionality to Cloud Computing?

It has the ability to transform the atmosphere in your business, reducing equipment costs and shifting labor to outsourced services. In the high pressure environment of survival, reducing costs is something in everyone's forecast. However I would think about this carefully, because the rules are still being written on Cloud Computing.

There is only so much information I personally am going to let go beyond my internal computers and servers. This mirrors my philosophy on business functions I will never outsource - finance, marketing and R/D. Yours may be different, but I feel that those three functions define so much of what a company is that they should be carefully guarded and secured. In the Cloud, I would give up this security.

I would also be more vigilant about what my own employees could do on the Cloud. In some cases, lapses and carelessness can be embarrassing, and in other cases, they can be considered crimes. If it happens on internal computers, it may just be a local issue. In the Cloud, you might have to fend off federal wire fraud charges. If you think this is a stretch, note what can happen to an underage kid who posts pictures of his under-dressed, underage girlfriend to Facebook. Prosecutors in some cases are upgrading charges to that of an adult sex offender.

You have been using the Cloud successfully for years, but those have been defined uses, and the companies you have been using have been fairly clear on how to use their technology. As you puff your Cloud with more of your information and functionality, the rules become more general, and your culpability increases. Keep that in mind as you use more Cloud Computing, how you weather the experience is prognosticated on how well you manage the climate. Sunny days can be many if you do this well.