Monday, December 30, 2013

Google, the Cloud, the Internet Backbone

A natural progression: from cloud to internet backbone -- after all the internet is a cloud of networked computers/servers --

Does Google Want to Control More of the Internet Backbone?: " . . . By 2013, Google had invested about $23 billion in data centers, for example, and all that investment requires high-capacity backbone transport. In the third quarter of 2013 alone, for example, Google capital investment was about $2.3 billion, primarily for new data center capacity. But when a firm relies that heavily on cloud computing, it obviously will be able to justify operating a huge private network to support the performance of the data centers....the point is that large global enterprises always look at the cost and value of their networks... nor does either represent an attempt by enterprises to “control the Internet backbone” or compete with telcos. As with all other inputs, enterprises make “build versus buy” decisions. . . ." (read more at the link above)

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Friday, December 27, 2013

Simplifying CRM in the Cloud

Wall Street: Simplifying CRM in the Cloud
Technorati
For those of us living in the more general realm of technology, terms like SMM, CRM, and even SEO only begin to scratch the surface of our periphery.

Technorati

IBM Patents Cryptography Invention to Advance Security in the Cloud
eWeek
IBM has patented yet another cloud computing innovation, this latest one for a breakthrough data ... In November, IBM patented its cloud-based BPM system for combining big data from cloud services with data stored on in-house IT ...

DatacenterDynamics

SCAM: Why IT sector will bet on Social networking, Cloud services ...
Economic Times
A trend that started a few years back, albeit in silos, social networking, cloudservices, analytics and mobile computing, or SCAM, is now converging ...

Economic Times

Amazon taps into China's cloud computing market
WantChinaTimes
US retail giant Amazon will set up a data center to pilot its cloud computingservices in collaboration with enterprises in China in early 2014.

WantChinaTimes

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Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas from Alive in the Cloud!






















Cloud News below--computing, storage, infrastructure, security



Monday, December 23, 2013

Future of data storage

Future of data storage
QR Code Press
As cloud computing is gaining more and more popularity, people start asking... Hybrid cloud storage combines the advantages of both a private and a public ...

QR Code Press

NEC Australia and NEXTDC team up for secure Australian cloud
WhaTech
Business Enablement Cloud Solutions deliver on-demand CRM, Contact Centre, ... of their nationalcloud computing strategy,” said NEXTDC's Mr Scroggie.

Cisco Cloud Connections: Your Amazing Cloud Journey Starts Here
Telecom Reseller (press release)
Cloud computing is an irreversible trend in which enterprises are moving from careful contemplation to industry-wide adoption. The latest Cisco Global Cloud ...

Indian-origin Satya Nadella still leading horse in Microsoft's CEO ...
ANINEWS
14 (ANI): The chase for Microsoft's CEO has seen many business chiefs enter and exit the potential list, except the software maker's cloud computing executive ...

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Friday, December 20, 2013

Best- And Worst-Performing Cloud Computing Stocks

Best- And Worst-Performing Cloud Computing Stocks Dec. 9 To Dec ...
Forbes
stock performance The five highest performing cloud computing stocks year-to-date on the Cloud Computing Index are Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN), Qualys ...

Technology Analyst Jeff Kagan on Adobe Creative Cloud Success
Consumer Electronics Net
Adobe Systems Inc, makes both Acrobat software and Photoshop and reported a 22 percent increase in subscribers to its Creative Cloud services, according to ...

Microsoft Partners To Extend Azure Reach
InformationWeek
Microsoft is equipping these third parties its Cloud OS Network with the latest Microsoft Virtual ...The partners are launching their own Azure-like cloud services.

AWS C3 Posing Overload Impact on Cloud Computing Resources
Greatresponder.com
The Amazon web services announced its cutting edge cloud computing instances C3 backed by SSD storage and premium processors a few weeks back.

Greatresponder.com

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Wednesday, December 18, 2013

Lawsuits, IBM of hiding China risks, NSA spy scandal

Microsoft told everyone that the US Government (NSA) is an "advanced persistent threat" (a term applied to cybercriminals) -- ergo, if you are in bed with the NSA, you better disclose it to your stockholders, or be prepared for a stockholders' suit --

Lawsuit accuses IBM of hiding China risks amid NSA spy scandal | Reuters: "...The plaintiff in the complaint, Louisiana Sheriffs' Pension & Relief Fund, said this threatened IBM hardware sales in China, particularly given a program known as Prism that let the NSA spy on that country through technology companies such as IBM. The Baton Rouge pension fund said the revelation of Prism and related disclosures by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden caused Chinese businesses and China's government to abruptly cut ties with the world's largest technology services provider. It said this led IBM on October 16 to post disappointing third-quarter results, including drops in China of 22 percent in sales and 40 percent in hardware sales...."

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Monday, December 16, 2013

Google Cloud Compute Engine

Compute Engine — Google Cloud Platform: "High-performance virtual machines Compute Engine’s Linux VMs are consistently performant, scalable, highly secure and reliable. Supported distros include Debian and CentOS. You can choose from micro-VMs to large instances. Powered by Google’s global network Create large compute clusters that benefit from strong and consistent cross-machine bandwidth. Connect to machines in other data centers and to other Google services using Google’s private global fiber network. (Really) Pay for what you use Google bills in minute-level increments (with a 10-minute minimum charge), so you don’t pay for unused computing time...."

Google Cloud Compute goes live | PCWorld: "After running the service in preview mode for over a year, Google is making its IaaS (infrastructure-as-a-service) Google Compute Engine (GCE) available as a full-fledged commercial service. The company has established a service level agreement (SLA) where it guarantees GCE to be available 99.95 percent of the time. It has also cut prices and increased the number of options the service offers. GCE "is a long-term strategic bet for the company," said Brian Goldfarb, Google's head of cloud platform marketing, adding that "we have an incredibly high bar for what general availability means...."

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Friday, December 13, 2013

Cloud computing 2014 predictions

Cloud Computing 2014 -- encryption, scale, even better pricing --

Cloud Storage in 2014: 10 Bold Predictions
eWeek
There is no disputing this statement: 2013 was a breakthrough year for the development and the business of cloud storage. A recent survey showed that 60 ...

eWeek

Microsoft confirms encryption across cloud services
ZDNet
Summary: Redmond giant will undertake a large encryption effort across itscloud services portfolio and data centre links, while stepping up its legal objections ...

Times of India

Flexiant Partners with Africa Cloud Services in Bid to Take on New ...
HispanicBusiness.com
London, UK - Flexiant, a leading international provider of cloud orchestration software, announced today that it has partnered with Africa Cloud Services to ...

IBM's Big Plans for Cloud Computing
New York Times (blog)
Even more important, however, is that all the companies are developing knowledge through their cloud services of how to run truly huge Internet-based ...

New York Times (blog)

Cloud Computing Guru Marc Benioff Offered To Fix Healthcare.gov ...
Business Insider
It's no secret that the White House called in a bunch of Internet gurus from big U.S. tech companies to help them fix the floundering HealthCare.gov website.

Business Insider
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Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Cloud Computing Deal of $1.3 Billion, IBM and Dexia

Cloud Computing Deal of $1.3 Billion Between IBM, Dexia Europe.
Greatresponder.com
A Cloud Computing Based Service Delivery Deal of $1.3 Billion Struck Between IBM, Dexia and Other European Financial Institutes In Europe. Written by Maria ...

Greatresponder.com

Computing in the Cloud
The Hindu
Cloud computing is a phrase that's been very much in use since 2009 when the prospects of Web 2.0 loomed over the horizons. It is a concept whose history ...

The Hindu

Alba moves to the Cloud
HispanicBusiness.com
Aluminium Bahrain (Alba) has successfully moved to the Cloud computingwith Microsoft Windows Server 2012, thereby cutting the operational costs ...

eWeek

Alibaba opens cloud computing platform for Chinese banks incl ...
What's on Xiamen
Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba has set up a cloud computing service ... The Ju Baopencloud platform is being targetted at smaller and mid-size banks ...

Google Takes Aim at Amazon in the Cloud With This Recent Move
DailyFinance
... early lead in booming multibillion-dollar market for cloud computing services. ... budding cloud-services empire when it unveiled its Google Compute Engine ...

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Monday, December 9, 2013

Cloud Computing in Israel, Kit Dotcom's Mega iPhone app

Cloud computing in Israel: The risks, explained
GlobalPost
Amazon's breakout profitability is measured in cloud storage sold — not in books or goods. Moreover, the benefits of cloud computing are clear. Companies pay ...(read more at link above)

Kim Dotcom's Mega cloud storage service launches iPhone app
NDTV
Kim Dotcom's cloud storage service, Mega, has launched a new iPhone app, ... and manage their Mega cloud storage account and perform fast file transfers.

PRPick.com

Cloud computing for small business: 5 reasons why it's time to move ...
ITBusiness.ca (blog)
Your small business has dabbled in cloud computing. You send e-mails using Gmail, manage your customer relationships using Contactually and keep tabs on ...

ITProPortal

Google Could Attract Fines For Violating Dutch Data Protection Law ...
Headlines & Global News
Google's cloud services include leading internet connected services ...Google stores users' data on its "Cloud" storage service, which is via Internet and not ...

Headlines & Global News

Nigeria to overtake SA as cloud computing booms in Africa
HumanIPO
More Nigerian businesses will be using cloud-based services than in South Africa by ... cloud services, compared to 48 per cent in Kenya and 36 per cent in Nigeria. ... “Cloud computing is the next big step in the evolution of computing and the ...

HumanIPO

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Friday, December 6, 2013

Google, Amazon, Cloud Computing, secrets of scalability

Google, Amazon reveal their secrets of scalability | PCWorld: "Internet giants such as Google and Amazon run IT operations that are far larger than most enterprises even dream of, but lessons they learn from managing those humongous systems can benefit others in the industry. At a few conferences in recent weeks, engineers from Google and Amazon revealed some of the secrets they use to scale their systems with a minimum of administrative headache. At the Usenix LISA (Large Installation Systems Administration) conference in Washington, Google site reliability engineer Todd Underwood highlighted one of the company’s imperatives that may be surprising: frugality. “A lot of what Google does is about being super-cheap,” he told an audience of systems administrators. Google is forced to maniacally control costs because it has learned that “anything that scales with demand is a disaster if you are not cheap about it.” As a service grows more popular, its costs must grow in a “sub-linear” fashion, he said." (read more at link above)

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Wednesday, December 4, 2013

NSA Fallout, Tech Firms Feel the Chill in China

NSA Fallout: Tech Firms Feel a Chill - WSJ.com: "China represents about 10% of the global technology market, and accounts for 15% to 20% of global hardware demand, according to CLSA. The bank says Chinese companies control about 70% of the domestic market for telecommunications gear, but Western companies account for roughly 70% of sales of computer servers. China has long promoted Chinese technology suppliers, at the expense of foreign brands. But some observers detect a heightened push in recent months. The U.S.-China Business Council warned in an October report that Chinese regulators are pushing policies to subsidize domestic companies and promote cybersecurity in ways that will hurt foreign providers. Research firm Gartner echoed those concerns in an October report that mentioned weak sales of computer servers by IBM and HP."

More Cloud News below--computing, storage, infrastructure, security



Monday, December 2, 2013

The Watson cloud, IBM to open supercomputer to third party developers

The Watson cloud: IBM prepares to open supercomputer to third party developers | PCWorld: " . . . IBM is initially working with a handful of partners on the Watson cloud service, and each is developing specialized applications. Fluid is creating a Watson-powered program for retail. “The model is to have a running dialogue between the consumer and Watson,” which helps them make more informed buying decisions, High said. The Watson cloud will include a development toolkit, access to Watson’s API (application programming interface), educational material and an application marketplace. IBM also plans to work with venture capitalists to find startups that want to build software on Watson. Interacting with Watson is fairly straightforward for any programmers familiar with RESTful APIs, High said. Their real focus should be on understanding the fundamental difference Watson offers compared to past programming platforms. . . ." (read more at link above)

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