Great overview on making sense of your cloud strategy. Here are some notable sound bites:
Gartner’s definition of cloud computing: A style of computing where scalable and elastic IT-related capabilities are provided ‘as a service’ to external customers using Internet technologies. (No matter whose definition is used it’s always full of jargon)
“If someone is selling you a product, it is not a cloud solution.
“Cloud computing isn’t particularly secure or insecure. Rather, you should look at more specific concerns like where the data is stored and the policies of each provider.
“Beware of ‘cloud washing’, where vendors put a cloud name on their products or services without really changing the products.
“List of recommendations: understand the goals your organization wants to get out of cloud computing, look at public cloud solutions first, work with your users, and see how bookkeeping practices with cloud services will affect your business. Check your contract rights and responsibility, and seek cloud brokerages.
“The value of a cloud computing service is in the outcomes it enables, just as the value of a treadmill is in building heart health or losing weight.
Read the full commentary here.