Blog posts in Networking

Why 2012 is when businesses will embrace the cloud

Was 2011 the year of cloud computing? Whatever your view, there’s certainly no denying that it created a lot of hype.

I like to say it was the year when businesses discovered the Cloud. It’s during 2012 that we’ll see a bigger movement towards it.

Cloud computing has been around for years, but it was only last year that the technology and marketing hit that critical point where businesses could start to fully understand what it is.

This year, 2012, will be the real year of the cloud. This is why:

• We get cloud computing. Most businesses now understand cloud computing. In March 2011 we ran a Twitter poll which found only 64% of people who answered had heard of the cloud. The same question asked in January 2012 saw the figure jump to 91%. (This year’s poll also revealed  that although only 27% of respondents were using the Cloud, 75% said they would be considering it for 2012.)
• We like cloud computing. The cloud’s credibility has increased significantly. Along with other major companies, Apple can probably claim much of the credit for that, because it incorporated its own cloud service into advertisements for the new iPhone.
• It’s going to get social. Social networks show no signs of losing their popularity and the cloud is already starting to become more social, which makes it more appealing. Because cloud computing stores all your data centrally, it makes sharing and collaborating much easier. Take Salesforce: it’s taking this further with the introduction of Chatter, a private social network for employees.
• New jobs will emerge. Despite initial speculation that cloud computing would reduce the number of IT jobs available, 2012 will see new job titles emerging. The Recruitment & Employment Confederation recently announced that its members expect demand for staff with IT skills to increase in 2012. Job roles like ‘cloud transformation officer’ barely existed in 2011 and yet the number of roles available is set to grow this year.
• We trust it. Trust has always been a major issue with the cloud. People worry about where their data is stored, how safe it is and what the chance are of it getting lost. In response, cloud computing providers are addressing this issue, tightening security and demonstrating how the cloud often involves less risk than storing data locally.

At SpiderGroup, we are already seeing an increase in cloud popularity. We believe 2012 is, without doubt, the year of the cloud. And we promise not to say the same thing next year.

• Q&A: cloud computing security
• Cloud computing services to get you started
• Are you ready for cloud computing?

This guest post was written by Kerry Hale from SpiderGroup.

20 inspiring and insightful Steve Jobs quotes

1 “What made the Macintosh great was that the people working on it were musicians and poets and artists and zoologists and historians who also happened to be the best computer scientists in the world”

2 “Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected.”

3 It’s not the consumers’ job to know what they want.”

4 “Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of other's opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most importantly, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

5 “Things don’t have to change the world to be important.”

6 “Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me. Going to bed at night saying ‘we've done something wonderful’, that's what matters to me.”

7 “We don’t do market research. We don’t hire consultants. We just want to make great products.”

8 “The most compelling reason for most people to buy a computer for the home will be to link it into a nationwide communications network. We're just in the beginning stages of what will be a truly remarkable breakthrough for most people – as remarkable as the telephone.” (speaking in 1985)

9 “Simple can be harder than complex. You have to work hard to get your thinking clean to make it simple, but it’s worth it in the end because once you get there, you can move mountains.”

10 “My model for business is The Beatles: They were four guys that kept each other's negative tendencies in check; they balanced each other. And the total was greater than the sum of the parts. Great things in business are not done by one person, they are done by a team of people.”

11 “What a computer is to me is the most remarkable tool that we have ever come up with. It's the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds.”

12 “I'm the only person I know that's lost a quarter of a billion dollars in one year. It's very character-building.”

13 “You can’t just ask the customers what they want and then try to give that to them. By the time you get it built, they’ll want something new.”

14 “Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it.”

15 “You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”

16 “When you're a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you're not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You'll know it's there, so you're going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.”

17 “It’s really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.”

18 “Innovation comes from people meeting up in the hallways or calling each other at 10:30 at night with a new idea, or because they realized something that shoots holes in how we've been thinking about a problem. It's ad hoc meetings of six people called by someone who thinks he has figured out the coolest new thing ever and who wants to know what other people think of his idea.”

19 "I don't think I've ever worked so hard on something, but working on Macintosh was the neatest experience of my life. Almost everyone who worked on it will say that. None of us wanted to release it at the end. It was as though we knew that once it was out of our hands, it wouldn't be ours anymore. When we finally presented it at the shareholders' meeting, everyone in the auditorium stood up and gave it a five-minute ovation. What was incredible to me was that I could see the Mac team in the first few rows. It was as though none of us could believe that we'd actually finished it. Everyone started crying.''

20 “Stay hungry, stay foolish.”

Cloud computing legal dos and don'ts

Justice in the clouds? (Image: Ariaski on Flickr.)

When businesses use cloud computing, it often means they don't need to buy or install software, or run their own servers. The benefits can be compelling, but cloud computing also presents some interesting legal issues.

Contracts, data protection and copyright

Because cloud computing services involve storing data outside your business, usually on servers operated by another company, there are some contractual, data protection and copyright issues to be aware of:

• The risk of concluding contracts inadvertently. For example, if one of your employees signs up to a cloud-computing service using a computer at work for a purpose related to their employment, then your company could be bound by the terms of that cloud computing service - even if the employee acted without consulting anyone.
• The risk of data protection compliance. If your employees input personal data held by your business into the cloud, your company must comply with its data protection obligations - including those relating to the transfer of data.
• The risk of intellectual property infringement. Your business could be liable if staff post defamatory or copyright-infringing content into the public areas of cloud-computing services. Appropriate policies, procedures and training must be given to employees.

Licensing and software use

A software licence is the set of terms and conditions you agree to before you start using a piece of software or a cloud computing service. Software licensing can be confusing at the best of times, and there are some specific things to remember when you're choosing and using cloud computing services:

• You must have appropriate licences. Some cloud computing services are only licensed to be used at certain computers. So if any of your staff use them at computers without a licence, they commit copyright infringement.
   
  Also, licence terms can be narrow and may limit you to using the service only for your company's own purposes - so check your sub-contractors and business partners can use it too, if they need to.
• Using open source software. Many cloud computing services are built on open source software. However, some open source software requires software based upon it to be distributed under the same terms - i.e. made freely available. This could have consequences for your business, if you want to retain the software just for your use.
• Intellectual property indemnity. A cloud computing operator may not always own the intellectual property rights in the software used by their service. If that's the case, that operator has to sub-licence the software to its customers, or arrange a direct licence between its customers and the relevant software company. Check this has been taken care of, or your business could be liable for using unlicensed software.

International implications

It can be hard to tell where cloud computing services actually operate from. Even those that price their services in pounds may be based outside the UK. And if you are dealing with a UK company, they may still store your data on servers in other countries.

In most cases this isn't a problem, but it's wise to aware of the issues that can arise:

• Unexpected obligations. You need to make sure that foreign law does not result in unexpected and binding non-contractual obligations for your business. For example, in some countries you may have duties of good faith in negotiations which do not exist under English law.
• What happens if things go wrong? A cloud computing provider based in the EU can be sued in all the jurisdictions in which it provides services to its customers.
   
  But when a cloud computing provider is based outside the EU, it can be harder to enforce court orders against the company. It's usually best if the governing law of the contract is the local law of the cloud computing provider.

This article is for general purposes and guidance only and does not constitute legal or professional advice.

If Amazon can't make the cloud work, can anyone?

Inside a data centre. Photo from Neospire on Flickr under Creative Commons.

You might have read about problems last month with Amazon’s web hosting service. These affected many well-known websites, including Q&A social network Quora, Foursquare and Reddit.

The outage sparked some debate about how far businesses can rely on cloud services, especially if they’re unable or unwilling to commit to services offering a high level of security and backup.

Don’t let Amazon cloud your decisions

’The cloud’ has been billed as the be all and end all, but like any other business-critical service, you can only count on it if it’s backed up by solid business continuity planning.

Reading between the lines, the Amazon customers least affected by the outage were those with budgets big enough to afford the company’s premium service. They get the peace of mind of knowing that their data’s stored in more than one location.

However, many start-ups and small businesses use cloud services in order to benefit from low up-front costs and manageable ‘pay as you go’ charging. For some, this means they invest in a bottom dollar package from a mass market provider.

But if you don’t choose wisely, taking this route can end up compromising business continuity. What’s more, you may eliminate one of the main reasons for taking the cloud computing route in the first place: complete assurance that your data and systems are protected in every eventuality.

Multiple locations matter

If your chosen cloud computing supplier can only offer hosting from a single location – also called a ‘data centre’ - within your budget allowance, it’s usually worth shopping around. A niche provider that caters specifically for smaller businesses like yours may understand and meet your requirements more effectively.

The key thing is the number of places where your data is stored. Without at least two data centres, you leave yourself at higher risk of service interruptions and failures. Having all your applications and data stored at one site may be no safer than sticking your server in the corner of the office.

True, cloud services have expert engineers available to fix problems quickly, but if your data’s hosted in at least two separate locations it is highly unlikely that both environments will be affected at the same time. So if there’s a problem, you can keep working as normal.

Do remote networks right

My message to companies out there that are questioning cloud technologies after the Amazon outage is to take heed: remote networks are more secure than many traditional systems and, moreover, easier to reinstall should onsite disaster strike.

However, this only applies if you’ve got the right provisions in place. Make sure your cloud provider has more than one data centre, and examine their business continuity plans in detail.

Adrian Smith is MD of Heywood-based IT services provider Flexsys.

• Are you ready for cloud computing?
• Q&A: Cloud computing security

The broadband lottery: here's why your internet connection might be slower than you'd hoped

Is your broadband slower than this? (Image: RogueSun Media under Creative Commons)

Broadband companies have been criticised for advertising connection speeds that only a fraction of customers ever actually get. But it's not always easy for them to predict what speed an individual customer will receive. Sebastien Lahtinen from thinkbroadband explains.

Imagine you run manufacturing business that uses widgets as a component. You see an advertisement on a website from a company offering to supply 'up to 24 widgets' each month for a fee of £35 per month.

However, when your first delivery arrives you find it only includes nine widgets. On querying the error, the supplier's response is that they only ever promised 'up to' 24 widgets.

It sounds confusing, unfair and illogical. Yet this is exactly how most broadband services are sold. And the grounds for it are actually quite reasonable.

What is broadband?

Broadband describes what were considered fast internet connections at a time when slow connections were the norm. Most UK broadband is delivered using DSL technology (most commonly ADSL, which stands for asymmetric digital subscriber line). This uses old-fashioned copper telephone cables to get an internet connection into your business.

There are two main causes of slow broadband speeds and it is important to distinguish between them.

1. Congestion

Congestion can affect all internet connections. It simply means that too many people are trying to transfer too much data at once. Like having too many cars on the roads, it leads to delays in data reaching its destination.

Each broadband supplier has to strike a balance between capacity and congestion. To keep costs down, many broadband suppliers - especially those in the price-sensitive consumer market - operate a high contention ratio. This is the number of connections being sold compared to the total available capacity.

At peak times, broadband suppliers with a high contention ratio may not be able to service all customers at full speed.

To alleviate this problem, some companies implement traffic management systems. These can differentiate between different kinds of internet traffic, ensuring that when you're using your connection for something that requires a fast response - like video calls or online gaming - you get given priority.

Many business broadband packages have a low contention ratio. However, even so, your broadband supplier can't guarantee good end-to-end performance. The internet is, essentially, a network of connected networks. Your broadband supplier only has control over their bit of it. If congestion is a problem elsewhere, they can't do anything about it.

2. Technology

One of the main problems with ADSL broadband is that it relies on old copper telephone lines which were never designed for digital communications.

Signals degrade as they travel along the line, meaning that the further you are from your local telephone exchange, the slower your broadband service will be. In general, if you're within 2km of the telephone exchange then you will receive the top speeds, with a sharp fall thereafter depending on the type of ADSL technology used.

The upshot of this is that ADSL broadband suppliers can't market a service with a definite speed until they know the exact telephone line on which it will be used.

Before you order, most providers will give you an estimate of the speed they expect you to achieve. Unfortunately, this can't be guaranteed either, particularly as broadband providers don't own the phone lines they use.

They have to pay Openreach (the division of BT which maintains phone lines) for access to your line - and they pay the same regardless of what speed connection your line can support.

Confusing, isn't it?

What this means for you

If you're looking to purchase an internet connection, the key consideration should be how important the connection is to your business.

Every year, more companies are moving from local servers to cloud-based business applications, and from traditional telephone systems to VoIP services.

These applications require a reliable internet connection, so you need to look at not only the headline speed (which, as we've established, doesn't always tell the whole story) and price, but also the level of service on offer.

If your business can't function without internet access, make sure you build some redundancy into your connection - perhaps by using more than one technology or supplier. It's also important you look at upload speeds. These are important for some applications, like VoIP, yet many connections prioritise downloads, at the expense of upload speeds.

About the author

Sebastien Lahtinen is co-founder of thinkbroadband, the UK's first community dedicated to helping users resolve broadband problems. In addition to reporting on the latest broadband news, you can run a  speed test on your current service, view a broadband map showing locations of telephone exchanges, availability and speeds in your area, and check if your internet connection is ready for IPv6.

• More about your business internet connection
• Save money with VoIP
• Internet speed checker