Not Just a Pretty Dream: Why Cloud Computing May Be the Most Durable 2.0 Tech.

It appears that cloud computing is the latest Web 2.0 technology under fire in the blogosphere, but of all the tech that's come out of this whole new way of doing things, I'd place my bets on cloud computing being around past anything else that falls.

Steven Hodson at WinExtra had a great breakdown of the major players in the space, but I disagreed with his concerns about security. He referenced the amount of data that can be stolen during a security breach of corporate systems, but the reality is that many of those corporate systems are being run on server farms anyway. Companies have been outsourcing their data centers for years, although I spent one very fun summer co-op at Eastman Kodak Company, loading VAX tapes into the drives. But companies like Blue Cross Blue Shield have used data centers run by providers like EDS for decades; why should security for cloud computing be any worse (or any better, true)?

We have gotten to a point where software-as-a-service (SaaS) and platform-as-a-service (PaaS) make it much easier to develop sotware. Bringing back the old corporate buzzword bingo phrase of "core competencies," it makes more sense to hand off the hardware maintenance portion of being an application company rather than have to buy hardware as well as pay someone to maintain it.

Peter Laird has an amazing breakdown of every single service provider that I could think of or look up as well as a few that were new to me. The services listed detail how many services are out there to allow developers to focus on the product they are developing instead of the day-to-day basics that eat a lot of time and distract developers from their end goal, which is to have a great problem-solving app. Why should they continue to re-invent the wheel each time to get things done?

So having already seen both Steven Hodson and Peter Laird's breakdowns, when I saw Jon Stokes' dismissal of cloud computing today, I was floored. To me, Ars Technica is often the Bible of what's hot and what's not, but his quick agreement with IBM's disdain for cloud computing really shocked me. Of COURSE IBM doesn't want to think about cloud computing as the new way of doing things. Imagine a world where you run your app in the cloud, taking advantage of a platform like Appistry (our coverage) or GigaSpaces where you can quickly spin servers up and down AS YOU NEED THEM. Imagine if IBM's customers suddenly expected to have all their hardware needs met on demand, instead of paying for all the hardware you'd ever need each and every month in case that huge surge happens THAT month. It's a ding in IBM's bread-and-butter revenue stream, and they sure don't like hearing that people are getting Amazon Web Services bills that total under $100 a month.

In order for smaller companies to be able to compete, they have to be able to run lean and mean. You can't start a Google or an Amazon today and have that huge initial investment in hardware. It takes too long, costs too much, and is no longer the way that companies are doing business. Cloud computing is the obvious answer, and as the space matures, it may eventually replace all the data centers as they exist. IBM already has the hardware, so why are they so resistant to changes in how they use it?