‘Is the cloud mature? It’s been around for so long – way before people started calling it the cloud. I, personally, can’t wait for people to stop calling it the cloud.’
And there we were, ready to get excited about yet another 21st century technical revolution. So much for this ‘cloud’ thing that’s all lined up to change the way we work and play…
If it’s such old news already, why are Apple, Amazon, Google and Microsoft so excited about their new cloud ventures? How is the cloud getting so much airtime? And why am I attending an international forum dedicated to the cloud, its providers and purveyors, and a strange new world of terminology?
I am here because cloud computing most certainly will change the way we work and play. In fact, it already has – because media storage and delivery are in the front line. That means that pro audio, video, broadcast, installation, distribution et al are cloudbound. A quick check on the registered visitors is also telling – among them are representatives from the BBC (programming and R&D), Avid, the Fraunhofer Institute, EMI Music, the Royal Opera House, the Royal Albert Hall, Turkish Radio & TV, Virgin Media, Sony, F1 Management, NBC News, Sky News...
In America, Amazon has been streaming movies via the cloud since 2009. With DVD sales declining, the cloud could be DVD's last chapter. And Spotify is pure cloud.
An earlier Fast-and-Wide foray into the cloud traced the origin of the term to 1997 – ‘a computing paradigm where the boundaries of computing will be determined by rationale rather than technical limits’. But if the guy at the rostrum in front of me at the Cloud Computing World Forum knows his SaaS from his cirrus, the paradigm was simply waiting for a name.
And waiting for its time to come. Now, it has.
Show me the data
The guy on the rostrum does, indeed, know his cloudstorm from his thunderstorm. He is Ditlev Bredahl, CEO of a US-based operation called OnApp (whose Cloud Engine software enables cloud building), and he’s helping an engrossed audience find its way around cloud land. Unsurprisingly, security is one of cloud’s hot topics.
‘Remember those guys who made a living out of telling you that the Millennium Bug was going to make aeroplanes fall from the sky?’ Brendahl challenges. ‘Well, they’ve been out of a job for a while, but now they’re back and they’re telling you how dangerous the cloud is.’
Security concerns are as important as they are obvious. And getting comfortable with the cloud concept demands robust data management and security. ‘People do have real or imaginary concerns about where the data is,’ says Simon Abrahams, Head of Product Marketing (EMEA) at Rackspace – a world leader in cloud hosting systems that names NASA as a key user and co-developer of its OpenStack software. ‘NASA has more data than anyone else…’
Abrahams advocates an open-source approach to cloud hosting, and OpenStack serves a community that also includes Dell, Intel and Microsoft. As well as allowing rapid provisioning – the ability to allocate server (storage) space ‘in minutes, rather than days or weeks’ – that could have been designed with live concert streaming in mind. In broad business terms, he identifies this dynamic allocation of resources with the ability to react quickly to opportunities. He also warns of the dangers of being locked into proprietary systems that make transfer to an alternative system or company very difficult. And he’s very hot on security.
Europe’s largest private cloud host is Interoute, which has eight international data centres serving not only Europe but also as far afield as the US, Russia, South Africa and Turkey. No stranger to the music biz, the company counts EMI and the Universal Music Group among its clients, and a live streaming of a Coldplay concert among its largest events to date.
‘Security is a big issue,’ agrees Interoute’s Dirk Wehler. ‘Data can be placed in a specific country if a client requests it – this might be for legal or censorship reasons. But security goes beyond providing secure data storage, and we can also watermark data so that we are able to track it if necessary.’
He identifies quick and dynamic allocation of storage and network resources as being of particular relevance to both entertainment and news services – not only in their ready availability when required but also the advantage of not paying for your own servers and infrastucture when they are not.
Size doesn’t matter
So the cloud is going to be a defining factor in future music and programme storage and delivery. And very likely in their creation and management too. At least, at the ‘big’ end of the market.
But what does the cloud mean to small businesses or facilities? According to Lorenza Brescia, AMI Partners’ EMEA Director of Cloud Services, everything. She can see an imperative for small businesses across the board…
‘Multiple factors are giving cloud adoption strong momentum among SMB [small and medium business] users. Key among them is the growing ubiquity of broadband, the availability of infrastructures, the proliferation of mobile devices and the availability of a cloud proposition in line with core SMB needs.
‘Adoption is moving beyond email, productivity and virus protection, to more specialised applications that align with core business needs,’ she says. ‘SMB interest in cloud services… continues to rise across all geographies and vertical markets, with 60-70 per cent of SMBs across all regions demonstrating a willingness to invest in cloud solutions.’
So, the cloud’s the answer. It’s got everything we need to store, manage and deliver entertainment media. But we had better be quick off the mark, because one of the cloud’s strongest currencies is speed, and a leading market position will be a precious thing.
It’s just a shame that the companies we’re going to be talking about have some seriously uncool names – as you will see for yourself if you drop into the coming Cloud Computing World Forums in Brazil (August), India (September), Hong Kong (November), Dubai (February 2012) or South Africa (April 2012).