Microsoft cloud fits and starts.

CloudCamp Federal @ FOSE

By G C Network | February 9, 2009

Sign up now CloudCamp Federal @ FOSE, March 10,2009, 3pm – 8:30pm at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, 801 Mount Vernon Place NW , Washington, DC. As a follow-up…

Thank You NVTC “Cool Tech” and TechBISNOW !!

By G C Network | February 6, 2009

Thank you to Dede Haas, Chris D’Errico and the Northern Virginia Technology Council for the opportunity to speak at yesterday’s NVTC “Cool Tech” Committee meeting! The Agilex facilities were awesome…

A Significant Event in Cloud Interoperability

By G C Network | February 6, 2009

On Jan 20th, GoGrid released it’s API specification under a Creative Commons license. “The Creative Commons Attribution Share Alike 3.0 license, under which the GoGrid cloudcenter API now falls, allows…

Booz|Allen|Hamilton & Dataline Sponsor 2nd Government Cloud Computing Survey

By G C Network | February 4, 2009

Dataline, Booz|Allen|Hamilton and the Government Cloud Computing Community have teamed together to sponsor the 2nd Government Cloud Computing Survey. Cloud Computing has come a long way since the first survey six months…

Gartner Lays Out 7-year Plan for Cloud Computing

By G C Network | February 3, 2009

According to Gartner’s new report, cloud computing will go through three phases over seven years before it will mature as an industry; – Phase 1: 2007 to 2011 — Pioneers…

Cloud Interoperability Magazine Launches

By G C Network | February 3, 2009

My congratulations goes out today to Reuven Cohen on the launch of Cloud Interoperability Magazine. The site will focus on Cloud Computing, standardization efforts, emerging technologies, and infrastructure API’s. As the new…

Why Can’t We Eliminate the “Technology Refresh” RFP?

By G C Network | February 2, 2009

In order to maintain life cycle and technology, the Navy is upgrading server farms at fifteen (15) sites and any future sites throughout the Far East, Europe and Middle East…

Cloud & the Government Session at Cloud Computing Expo

By G C Network | January 29, 2009

Earlier this week I announced that I will be presenting at SYS-CON’s 2nd International Cloud Computing Conference & Expo in New York City this coming March 30-April 1, 2009. During…

CSC and Terremark target US Government with Cloud Computing

By G C Network | January 27, 2009

Today’s announcement by CSC reinforced the strong wave of cloud computing towards the Federal space. Ranked by Washington Technology Magazine as 9th largest (by contract dollar value) government contractor, this…

Should my agency consider using cloud computing?

By G C Network | January 26, 2009

This is clearly the question on the minds and lips of every government IT decsionmaker in town. Why should a government agency even consider cloud computing?  In reality, the decision…

Microsoft’s dance with cloud comuting is very puzzling.

Point 1:

The June 5th Wall Street Journal article discusses the friction between Steve Ballmer and Bill Gagtes over NetDocs, described by WSJ writer Bob Guth as ” a promising effort to offer software programs such as word processing over the Internet.” Sounding very similar to Google Docs, the project died because it would have eaten into Microsoft Office revenues.

Point 2:

Microsoft’s plans to open up it’s entire lineup of Internet services to developers under a “Cloud OS” moniker. Alternatively described as “cloud-centric” Brian Hall, general manager of Windows Live describes this effort as “A lot of the data, a lot of the apps, a lot of the interesting things are on the edge. They are on the PCs. They are on the Xboxes. They are on the phones.”

Point 3:
The ongoing Microsoft/Yahoo dance which seems to be focused on search engines and ad revenue, not cloud computing at all.

If Microsoft is planning on participating in the next revolution in computing, it really needs to change it’s box-centric view and get on with moving it’s applications onto the network. Cloud computing is about reducing reliance on the user client, not increasing it!

You should also read Blaise Zerega’s view on the matter under his Portfolio.com blog “Did Microsoft Let Cloud Computing Slip Away”

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G C Network