It’s about time somebody said it: “I really worry about everything going to the cloud.” Steve Wozniak, creator of the earliest widely used personal computer – the Apple II – spoke to a group recently in Washington, DC, and warned that cloud computing will be “horrendous”.
Personally, as a lifelong data professional and uber geek, I would say – it could be horrendous. The potential is certainly there. The shift to cloud computing puts the onus on the cloud providers to ensure safety and availability of the information contained in the cloud. Does that guarantee a horrendous outcome? I don’t think so. But it’s certainly possible. There’s unquestionably an element of risk involved. That’s why I only put certain digital assets in the cloud, and not others.
Wozniak, I believe, is speaking to the notion that most people and organizations are moving to shift larger amounts of information to the cloud, and therefore he’s convinced that it will ultimately be “horrendous”.
The key concept in cloud computing is the element of “control”. Who controls your digital assets? By “digital assets”, I mean – the software you’ve purchased, the eBooks you bought, your own personal data that you’ve developed, collected, and stored? Your documents you’ve written, your emails you wrote, sent, and received? Your family photos? Your scanned bills and bank statements?
Even your votes you’ve cast on official ballots in your local polling station – those are subject to the cloud as well. Everything that has been digitized is now subject to the major paradigm shift of moving the storage of such digital assets to the cloud.
The term “cloud” is intended to emphasize the nebulous nature of the storage of this information. You’re not supposed to be concerned with it’s location, it’s just “out there”. Somewhere. On some computer, connected to someplace on the Internet.
It could be the down the street. Or Siberia. Theoretically, it could be physically located in a satellite in outer space, literally.
You’re not supposed to be worried about it.
Wozniak apparently is worried about it.
Are you?