LSQHA Blog Reviews

Twitter is moving to its own data center, showing that sometimes the cloud is not ideal for the real-time web. This may seem ironic as cloud computing is largely credited for giving application developers access to commoditized server networks that they can scale up or down. Cloud services make it realistic for developers to create real-time services in the marketplace. Sponsor But at some point, the cloud is not ideal for a real-time web service provider. Twitter is a good example. And, so, we use this news to present our weekly poll: "Is the Cloud Suitable For Scaling Real-Time Applications?" Is the Cloud Suitable For Scaling Real-Time Applications? online survey According to Data Center Knowledge , Twitter now uses a managed hosting service from NTT America where it has a dedicated space. Twitter also uses Amazon Web Services to serve images, including profile pictures. Twitter parted ways with Joyent in January 2008. The move NTT America came in response to latency issues. Latency is not a major issue for small application developers that use a service like Rackspace or Amazon. But when a service scales, the issues become increasingly significant. John Adams of Twitter discussed scaling issues last week at Chirp, the Twitter developer conference. Chirp 2010: Scaling Twitter Latency issues pose a significant challenge to cloud computing services that serve real-time applications. It raises questions about how a service can scale in a cloud computing environment. In Twitter's case, the cloud did not do the job. Will the problem get worse? Raghavan "Rags" Srinivas thinks it could: "One of these fallacies is that "Latency is zero". In traditional computing, the compute and data was typically hosted on the same system and the data latency was determined by the storage disks and the data bus speeds. It was a simple matter of buying better hardware to overcome data latency if it was ever an issue. In cloud computing and especially when we get to network of clouds with data expected to flow around different clouds, latency (however minimal it is) could be an issue depending on the data being manipulated, the network speeds and so on. Add to this the fact that the entire data or part of the data should be encrypted and decrypted when it moves around unreliable and public networks, and the fact that data needs to be streamed, latency will soon add up and could become a serious issue." What do you think? Will latency emerge as one of the major issues for cloud computing service providers? Discuss

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Is the Cloud Suitable for Scaling Real-Time Applications?

The biggest cloud network in the world is owned by the mob. While you may think that Google, Amazon and Microsoft are the world's largest cloud providers it's really the Conficker worm that has helped criminal networks spawn a botnet of mass proportions. Sponsor How does Conficker meets the definitions of a cloud? According to the Spectre Group ,a veteran technologist explained the connection last week at the Cloud Connect conference in Santa Clara, Ca.: "Conficker controls 6.4 million computer systems in 230 countries at 230 top level domains globally, more than 18 million CPUs and 28 terabits per second of bandwidth, said Rodney Joffe, senior vice president and senior technologist at the infrastructure services firm Neustar. The biggest cloud on the planet is controlled by a vast criminal enterprise that uses that botnet to send spam, hack computers, spread malware and steal personal information and money, Joffe said. In other words, the cloud is mobbed up." The Spectre Group further explains how, Conficker meets the definitions. The botnet cloud is available for rent and and is just about anywhere in the world. It can be used for a variety of purposes, be a denial-of-service attack, spam distribution or data exfiltration. In fact, all that comment spam that plagues blogs could easily be spawned from the Conflicker cloud. Joffe used the presentation at the conference to illustrate the dangers of Conficker and and how it poses a threat to legitimate cloud computing providers. He said at the conference that Conficker has not been as active as it once was, but is still a threat. The Manchester, UK Police Department was hit in February. And it has a huge footprint, all over the world. The operators have a lot of experience, too, dating back to 1998. The Spectre Group says in comparison the legitimate players in the market are far smaller: "By the way, the biggest legitimate cloud provider is Google, based on Joffe's information, made up of 500,000 systems, 1 million CPUs and 1,500 gigabits per second (Gbps) of bandwdith. Amazon comes in second with 160,000 systems, 320,000 CPUs and 400 Gbps of bandwidth, while Rackspace offers 65,000 systems, 130,000 CPUs and 300 Gbps." The Conficker cloud demonstrates the illusions that have to be considered when thinking about cloud computing. It's not just the danger of a a PC being infected by a virus. It's the danger of another computer entering the criminal enterprise. Discuss

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The Largest Cloud in the World is Owned By A Criminal Network

There is a phenomenon among consumers that is evidenced by the rise in popularity of sites that allow users to share information about the products they buy or want to buy with friends and other shoppers like them. These sites exist because consumers inherently trust the opinions of their friends and their peers when it comes to purchasing and business related decisions, and they trust them a whole lot more than they trust most marketing campaigns. Author John Jantsch , who previously penned the book Duct Tape Marketing is a few weeks away from publishing his second book which focuses specifically on the power of referrals. Sponsor The book, titled The Referral Engine: Teaching Your Business to Market Itself , hits bookshelves in mid-May, and could be an excellent resource for early-stage startups and entrepreneurs-to-be. Jantsch's first book did so well that it lead to the creation of the Duct Tape Marketing System and the Duct Tape Marketing Coach Network, while additionally earning accolades for both Jantsch's blog and his podcast on small business marketing which continues to release episodes today . In his new book, Jantsch explores how companies can strategically market their products to take advantage of the referral and peer review phenomenon of consumer buying habits. As Jantsch points out in a video explaining his motives behind the book (embedded below), he discovered that most successful small business which are thriving off referrals didn't do so by including some special sauce into their recipe. Instead, he says that these companies are, by their very nature, "more referable" than others. Some of Jantsch's suggestions for being more referable include making and effort to communicate personally with customers via social media and other means, being sure your customers know who they should be referring to, and getting your sales team on board with referral strategies. Early anticipatory praise of the book is already coming in from the likes of author Chris Brogan, Silicon Valley investor Guy Kawasaki, and Zappos founder Tony Hsieh whose upcoming book we previewed a few weeks ago . A free download of the first chapter is also available on the book's homepage, and the full book, coming in around 250 pages, will be available on May 13 according to Amazon . Check back here next month after the book publishes for a more in-depth review, and in the meantime, keep an eye out for ways to boost your company's referral engine. Discuss

Link:
Weekend Reading: The Referral Engine, by John Jantsch (Preview)

Sure they are, at least according to Palm, and to Amazon, where they are available for exactly that much, as long as the buyer is willing to sign a two-year service contract. The Palm Pre Plus and the Palm Pixi Plus are both on sale for a single red cent (U.S.) in conjunction with the service agreement. The original Pre price on Amazon was $699.98 and the Pixi was offered at $399.98. The service agreement is through Verizon Wireless. Sponsor The customer reviews on the site are all positive, though some have issues with the battery life. Of course, one of the reviewers may stand in for the others when he says, "I am a huge Palm fanboy." Given that the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing sometimes in even small companies, to say nothing of companies the size of Palm, and given the news that Palm is apparently for sale , it's impossible to decide that this is part of an overall strategy or just a little left-hand action. Discuss

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Palm Phones: Not Worth a Cent?

Cloud computing creates enough disruptions for small businesses that it seems almost folly when we hear some of the stories we do. We heard one story about an IT department that said that the company could not afford to have more people accessing the Internet. Yes, the Internet is too expensive for small business. Maybe it's time to scrap the dial up? Sponsor Cloud computing is one of those classic disruptions to a business that over time becomes part of the fabric for a how a company operates. You can either get into it now and be a leader or wait and join with the rest of the masses. That's not to say going with the masses is a bad thing. Every company has a different timeline. But take this into consideration: Think you can't take on the big companies in your market? Think again. A study by K2 Advisory finds that adoption rates by smaller organizations of public cloud and SaaS services from vendors such as Amazon and Google will outpace the adoption rate of larger enterprises by a factor of two. That means while the big guys are scratching their heads, the smaller, smarter players can potentially make inroads into markets where they could not go before. Why? It's just easier to scale and integrate on a global scale. "In five years' time the provision of IT to mid-sized and smaller businesses (of less than 1000 employees) will be quite distinct in terms of cloud adoption from enterprises," said Kathy Ring of K2. " 'Indeed, it could be argued that small and mid-sized business use of cloud computing will enhance their agility and their ability to bounce back more quickly from the recession of 2009/10. Many Western enterprises, however, will continue to find that their IT systems are increasingly sclerotic, constrained by client-server ERP systems.' " Cloud services leverage the massive server capacity available. It's elastic in nature, meaning it can scale up or down, based on demand for the service. A small business can expense the cost as opposed to purchasing an IT asset such as a server. It's a big reason why online services for small business have grown at such a clip. For example, online conteny management systems are now available that can be used as an alternative to making investments in services that require substantial IT investments. It has meant that small startups are competing in much larger markets against very big competitors. Box.net , for example, just received $15 million in funding. Their target: Microsoft Sharepoint. Of course, technology companies provide the ability to scale in different ways than other types of services. But there are plenty of examples for how this movement is taking hold. Really, any company can leverage the cloud to take advantage of its storage and application infrastructure. So, where do you start? Start by trying out some services to get a feeling for what you can do: Google Docs. See how it compares to Microsoft Office. Skype. Explore how you can use Internet-based services to replace voice and video. SugarSync. Get access to your desktop from anywhere, any time. Services like SugarSync offer the capability to access your file and desktop from anywhere you may be: Small businesses may feel overwhelmed by cloud computing. But it's worth the effort in experimenting. There is a small window that is open now. Companies that can take advantage of it may be best positioned to compete against their larger counterparts. Discuss

Link:
How Cloud Computing Can Help A Small Business Get Out of the Recession