Myths of Cloud Computing
One day not so long ago I was driving into work thinking about cloud computing and why it is all the rage. I have never liked the idea but I was trying to think of a way to help others see my point of view. On the surface it seems fine, offload the hassle of storing and backing up your data to a third party. What could be easy. I started thinking about other things in life that are clouds, not necessarily cloud computing but clouds. Then it hit me. Electricity! is a cloud, Cable TV is a cloud, in the end almost every utility or service offered by anyone could be considered a cloud. Then I started to think about what I didn’t like about these services. The following is my comparison.
Let’s start with the Myths of Clouds
- The cloud will always work – This is the idea that some mythical service will always be at the ready, no matter where you are. So when is the last time your electricity wasn’t working. How did it make you feel. I know anytime the power is off at my house I feel completely helpless to do anything about it. Some people have generators, solar panels and the like, but most just sit in the dark and wait for the magical electric company cloud to start working. Have you ever tried to find out what went wrong, how long until it will be back on… I think you have and you never find those things out. So when I think of cloud computing I don’t think of when it is working, I think of when it wouldn’t be, how would this effect me. In life being self sufficient is a very strong position to be in. Depending on a cloud for your works, your code, your letters, your data puts a person at a distinct disadvantage.
- Your data is private – As data flows across your computer screen, out your router to your ISP’s network to various other mid points and finally to its resting place in your cloud, think about how many different computer systems have just touched your data. What are they doing to it, did they save it? Are all of there employees happy? Are they organizing it without your knowledge? Do you want to worry about things like this. Over the years I’ve heard the analogy of a letter in an envelope as your data travels across the big internet range, but unless you encrypt your data end to end, everyone along the way can take a peek and do what they want. In the news lately have been alot of stories about ISP’s “managing” their networks for P2P and whatnot. I see this as one of two things and maybe both. 1) Your ISP wants to offer you services, it wants to get in the middle of whatever it is you want to do. They don’t know quite how to do this but they feel at some point the opportunity will present itself and they want to be ready. 2) The government is/has mandated that ISP’s have a way to “answer” the government’s subpoena’s. The scary part is that nobody knows what type of information the government will want in the future, and I believe ISP’s are doing the governments dirty work before it has even been asked to dig up the dirt.
- Do you retain rights over your data – To use flickr do you give up rights to your photos, YouTube? Google Docs? Check the EULA you do and you either agree or don’t use the service. We all have a choice. I think that choice should be NO and here is why. The little tricks these services are doing is the old convince with the verbal word but get the truth down on paper. Have you ever been in a negotiation and had a sales person tell you something that later turned out to be false. Could you do anything? Not at all, whatever you signed was what you agreed to no matter what. So when you click “I Agree” on that EULA popup that is you agreeing period. Second almost every EULA allows the service company to change anything they want and you still have “agreed” sometimes without being notified at all (you’ve agreed to that to). Does this sound right to you. It doesn’t sound ok to me. What happens if you now don’t want to use the service. You erase your profile, you remove your data but wait! They still get to keep it even thou you think you’ve deleted it. Nice for them huh!
- The cloud will protect you – So you don’t buy or care about my three previous points. Your not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to be afraid of. I beg to differ. In a society where big business and the government are “in business” the citizens of that country are in big trouble. What is legal today may not be legal tomorrow. Do you really want your thoughts your private data to be sitting in the cloud somewhere for anyone at some future point in time to have access to. Do you think the End User Agreement for this cloud service will include protections for you or will it have every conceivable out for the cloud service leaving you hanging by the noose. Do you think if this cloud service gets a subpoena that they will notify you ahead of time? When do you if ever think you would find out. What if under the “Home Land Security Act” the government just wants to cruise around your data, take a peek, see what your up to? How does that make you feel. Ok? Hey if it stops a terrorist why not I’ve got nothing to hide. Ok neither do I but I still don’t think the forefathers had this in mind when they wrote the constitution I think they had freedom for the people in mind.
- Who assumes the risk – You do period. Look at credit card companies, sure they limit your liability for charges to $50 but what about the new issue of identity theft. Has any of the companies whose “data” (that would be your information about you) gets stolen ever had to respond to you the customer. Sure some get fined, who gets the money? Not you! Not me! Who suffers when they don’t take care of your personal information, you do! Not them.
What can you do
- Learn how to make your data available to your devices from your home network. Do you need email access away from the home, don’t use a web based email service, set your home computer to download and delete the mail off of the mail server. Then access you email from your computer. Sure the information was still out there once but the trail runs cold. Did you read it, do you still have it. Nobody knows but you because you have taken possession of it in a private way.
- Fight your ISP’s for more upstream bandwidth. This is the bandwidth that goes from your home to a device, website, etc. If you have slow upstream them accessing your home network will be slower than accessing other services from the same device. Most ISP’s only quote the download speed. Comcast 8Megs yea down but up is only 768k! incrediblily slow when trying to read emails, stream videos from your home collection, etc.
- Learn to ask the right questions, instead of listening to the marketing hype. Learn to be suspicious, nothing is free. What does the service company get for offering this service for free, even if they charge money, what power to they obtain by being the “collector”, “Possessor” and “Gate Keeper” of all of this information. A good example is Stock Market Trading firms. They all offer nice little “Portfolio” Trackers, and “What if’s” for it’s customers to “try you theories” out. This sounds great, you get a little space in the world to hold your next big stock market idea. Except there is something wrong… They get to hold “Everyone’s” next be idea for the stock market. Now that is power. They can now go through everyone’s data, mining it and using it for their purposes. Doesn’t this give them a better advantage from “your” data than you get from it? I think so. Do your next big plan offline it will stay private.
- Realize that there is no free lunch. Companies are presenting their services like a drug dealer would present their drug. The first one is free, then you get hooked and then they charge.
In Summary
In the end do you want control of your private data and your life. If you do then learn and fight for keeping your data on your network not on someone elses. As a final idea to take away ask yourself couldn’t a service like facebook work by saving your profile on your local machine and then allowing the facebook cloud to access your data when you allowed it too. Think about this I’ll wait. Did it hit you like a sledgehammer, It does me. Now think about your health records, wouldn’t you feel better if Google Health stored your records on your computer, then you selected which doctors, which hospitals would have access to it, if you ever become uncomfortable you could simply turn off access. Of course this isn’t perfect since once someone accesses your data they can make a copy of it for themselves but still being able to shutoff access to businesses or individuals that you didn’t want to have access would be real consumer protection. Lastly if your data is stored only on your computer, inside your house and the government wants access who do they need to come see, YOU.
tim