Government in the Cloud

Cloud Computing as a Strategic Asset

By G C Network | April 30, 2009

For some reason, this week seems to have more in it than most. While the steady stream of briefing request seem to be increasing, the post briefing discussions also seem…

Vivek Kundra: “Engage the American People in their Daily Digital Lives”

By G C Network | April 25, 2009

Today I attended a very impressive talk by the Federal CIO, Mr. Vivek Kundra at a Northern Virginia Technology Council Public Policy event. His open and “matter of fact” approach…

McKinsey vs. Booz Allen Hamilton !

By G C Network | April 21, 2009

A community skirmish reminiscent of the recent “manifestogate” has apparently erupted around the McKinsey & Co. report “Clearing the air on cloud computing“. Booz Allen Hamilton Principals Mike Cameron and…

Oracle Buys Sun!!

By G C Network | April 20, 2009

Swooping in from nowhere, Oracle buys Sun for $7.4B!! “This morning, the companies announced that they’d struck a deal worth $7.4 billion or $5.6 billion net of Sun’s cash and…

Aneesh Chopra Nominated For Federal CTO

By G C Network | April 20, 2009

Although Aneesh Chopra is a new name for most, he is well know in Virginia as Governor Tim Kaine’s Secretary of Technology. For the Commonwealth, he was charged with leading…

Could Cloud Computing Cost More?

By G C Network | April 16, 2009

In a recent conference, analyst William Forrest says that large companies could end up paying more than twice as much by using cloud based services. According to a Forbes.com report,…

Cisco’s Cloud Computing Strategy

By G C Network | April 10, 2009

A couple of weeks ago, Krishna Sankar provided a glimpse into Cisco’s cloud computing strategy in a presentation titled “A Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Inter-Cloud” . The presentation outlined the…

NCOIC and Cloud Computing: An Update

By G C Network | April 8, 2009

As the NCOIC gets it’s arms around this new paradigm, the Cloud Computing Working Group has focused on establishing a roadmap for providing value to the industry. Using the established…

SUN-IBM Talks Breakdown

By G C Network | April 6, 2009

As reported in multiple sources today, including Reuters, Sun has apparently rejected a purchase offer by IBM. “Shares of Sun Microsystems Inc tumbled 22.5 percent after it rejected a $7…

Former DoT CIO on Cloud Computing

By G C Network | April 3, 2009

Last month, former Transportation Department CIO Dan Mintz offered his views on cloud computing to Eric Chabrow, Managing Editor of Government Information Security. According to Mr. Mintz, there is currently…

Back in mid-September, there was quite a thread in the Google Cloud Computing Group on the use of cloud computing by the federal government.  Some of the interesting comments were:
“Not an actual use case yet, but I see that electronic voting (e.g. US presidential elections) would be a good use case for cloud computing, given technology allows eliminate electoral fraud and provides reliable audit trail. “
(NOTE: Throughout the thread, many participants disgreed with this as a good use case)
“Another use case in my mind would be optimization of USPS, that might be beneficial for both government, businesses and cloud providers, but I’ll leave it here, until I’m ready with specifics.” 
“As the first U.S. E-Govt Administrator, I am very intrigued by applications of Cloud Computing to government.  The best use case for this would be electronic filings, especially quarterly Tax payments and annual Tax returns.  However, business gateways and citizen service portals that cut across levels of government would also be good. “
“Another one would be turbotax etc.” 
“At CNIPA (the Italian eGovernment-supporting technical body) we are just organizing a series of seminars on cloud computing with industry and consultancies. My understanding is that electronic voting will not be a viable use case for a number of reasons which have little to do with the infrastructure or the paradigm that might be used. Much better eGovernment use case could be a “my government” portal, where people could exchange official communications with the administration, update their filings and perform payments after being digitally identified. A cloud infrastructure could be the best choice to experiment with a “zero-latency government”, where back-office interactions are not visible to citizens. There are a lot of things that should be analysed and piloted before, including legislative and privacy issues. The effort could be extremely rewarding, though.”
Follow me at https://Twitter.com/Kevin_Jackson

G C Network