Much like ‘The Internet’ in the 90s, ‘The Cloud’ seems to be today’s often-used-but-only-partially-understood techie term. Once a vague conceptual evolution of enterprise computing that struck as much fear as it did curiosity (so I’m just uploading my files into the ether?!?!), it is now something most of us interact with every single day, sometimes without even realizing.
“Everything’s gonna move to the Cloud soon man…”
…”what’s ‘the Cloud?’”
… “not sure”
- A conversation I probably had sometime in the early 2000s -
Any time you check your email, post a pic to Instagram, add a contact to the address book on your iPhone or watch 5 episodes of Extreme Cheapskates in a row on Netflix (what am I doing with my life?!) you are effectively interacting with the Cloud.
That said, there is a lot of uncertainty when it comes to explaining what the Cloud actually is. Ignoring any heavy-handed meteorological metaphors and as a Product Manager at Triplay, who specializes in Mobile UX, here are 3 things I think you need to know about the Cloud.
1. The Cloud is not a new name for ‘The Internet’
In simple terms, the Internet is a network of computing resources… and so is the Cloud.
This doesn’t mean however, that when we say ‘the Cloud’ we are merely repackaging a buzzword for the purposes of marketing – as common misconception would perhaps dictate.
The Internet has evolved in recent years to become a utility we depend on for being available when we want it, where we want it. Not only that, but we expect an uninterrupted experience when we switch between websites, apps and even devices. The Cloud is what allows this to happen.
If, for example, I read an email on my phone, I now expect that same email to be marked as ‘read’ when I switch to using my tablet. In this instance, the Cloud is what tells my tablet ‘hey, he’s already read that email on his phone.” I may even use a different email app on each device - it doesn’t matter because the Cloud ensures they are all in sync with each other. This is just one simple, everyday interaction made possible by the Cloud; You can substitute reading emails in this story with editing photos, writing documents or working with any other piece of content we create or manage using the internet.
If we consider the Cloud as being what powers a smarter, more seamless experience of the Internet then we are getting closer to the truth.
2. The Cloud is good business
Companies that use the Cloud do so because it is cost-effective, hugely scalable and takes away the hassle of managing computing resources in-house. Instead of investing in expensive data centers of their own, most companies now use services such as Amazon AWS to store, manage and process their data. Companies only pay for what they use and are all but guaranteed to never run out of space or processing resources as capacity becomes increasingly an on-demand feature. That app you use to send picture messages to your friends suddenly sees a spike in new users?… no problem. The company behind it can easily expand to accommodate, thanks to the Cloud.
The Cloud is where your Emails are stored, your Instagram photos are uploaded to, what your iPhone uses to back-up your contacts and where the videos you watch on Netflix are streamed from. No longer an intimidating concept reserved for large-scale enterprise use, it is now almost universally employed by all kinds of businesses and it makes both financial and operational sense to do so. Smaller businesses are now able to power their apps and services with the same reliability, security and speed as much larger ones.
3. The Cloud is great for users, too
Users also benefit from the Cloud in multiple ways. Perhaps the most obvious example to be highlighted is the ubiquity of your content and the ease with which you can access it.
Pre-Cloud, we moved photos, videos, music and documents around manually. External hard drives, USB thumb drives, CDs, DVDs… you couldn’t listen to that album on your MP3 player unless you dragged it from the music folder on your desktop and dropped it into the file system of the device. The whole process was as tangled as the pile of USB cables you kept in that drawer.
These physical objects and the laborious task of manual data transfer are now being replaced by the Cloud, meaning now, once your album is uploaded, it is accessible from pretty much anywhere with an internet connection.
Cloud-based storage/syncing services such as Dropbox, BitCasa or Sugarsync are fulfilling the needs of users who want ALL their content on demand no matter where they are or what device they are using.
Then there are the more focused solutions with interfaces and sets of features that cater for more specific needs. Services such as Picturelife, Flickr or Loom that deal in photos and videos or Google Music, Amazon Cloud Player and MyMusicCloud that bring the music listening experience to the cloud. With MyMusicCloud, we crafted a product that utilizes cloud technology not because it is the buzzword du jour but because we feel it enhances the user’s music collection by making it available for a user to manage and listen to anywhere, any time on any device without the need for dragging and dropping or even plugging anything in.
So there you have it. A dangerously over-simplified look at the Cloud. Such a vast subject simply cannot be covered in one blog post but hopefully after reading this, the next time someone asks you what the Cloud is you will be able to at least stall them for a while.