The resultant and significant savings in facility running costs are augmented by improvements in the speed of application development. Because customers do not have to engineer for peak loads dramatic improvements in computer capacity can be readily delivered.
Increased High-Speed Bandwidth - The central technologies that are making all this distributed centralized cloud computing a realistic and viable choice and hence its rapid uptake by business and consumers alike are the networking technologies that have recently delivered massive increases and capabilities at relatively minimal fiscal investments.
Improvements in fiber optic transmission media and 10 Gigabit Ethernet in combination deliver ultra high-speed bandwidth capabilities that make it possible to receive the same degree of agility and rapid response times from centralized infrastructure at all geographically dispersed sites.
It no longer matters which distributed centralized facility you connect with. The service response and delivery will be of the same high speed standard anywhere and everywhere. Nor does it matter from which of a client's facilities the cloud computing services are accessed from.
This latter point seems to have had the most influence since branch offices can now have head office transmission and processing capabilities and performance. A fact not lost on the corporate world.
Cloud Computing Providers
Players in the cloud computing service provision game include the likes of Amazon, Google, Hewlett Packard, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Salesforce, SAP and Yahoo!
Cloud Computing Users
Some of the early adopters of cloud computing services include individuals and small organizations through to very large conglomerates such as: General Electric, L'Oréal, Procter & Gamble, Valeo and the WWE.
It must be noted that traditional ISPs are not dragging the chain and are getting in on the cloud computing service provision industry in a big way. Tier 1 ISPs do after all have a huge advantage in that they already have, own or have peering agreements in place concerning the Internet backbone and IP Transit arrangements other would-be players will need to negotiate.
As already noted web hosting services are a major component of current cloud computing implementations and will undoubtedly grow exponentially as Web 2.0 and all its additional user capabilities become the true de facto standard for the Internet and websites in particular.
Reduced Control
It must be noted that the user of cloud computing services is for the large part totally dependent upon the cloud computing service provider for such administrative responsibilities as data security, backup, disaster planning and recovery, encryption, accessibility, authentication, regulation and many regulatory requirements. Data sanitization once data stored in a cloud computing environment has passed its user's use by date is another concern.
Security Concerns
In general; the security aspects of a cloud computing service are primarily the concern and prerogative of the cloud computing service provider. All would-be customers should check very thoroughly the proposed providers intended operating procedures and practices as well as their track record in these regards.
It is very hard for the customer to verify the actual current security practices and implemented initiatives of a cloud computing service provider because the customer generally has no access to the provider's facility which can be comprised of multiple facilities spread around the globe.
There can be little doubt that the Service Level Agreements (SLAs) that the customer of cloud computing services will need to negotiate with their prospective cloud computing services provider will for the reasons outlined above take on greater importance than has often been the case with Help Desk type SLAs in the past. Whether the cloud computing services provider develops a range of SLAs themselves or their prospective clients develop them remains to be seen.
What is clear is that the metrics of such SLAs do need to be very clearly detailed with clear and precise delineation of roles and responsibilities regarding a broad range of potential eventualities. It might pay to get the lawyers in on this one.
