One problem with the cloud: Obsolescence of applications
ReadWriteWeb lists 10 of its favorite Web applications that have disappeared from the Web. In so doing, it calls out a problem with cloud-based applications that lack an open-source license: once they're gone, they're really gone.
I've mentioned before enterprises that have desperately tried to get their proprietary vendors to open-source their code, only to see the vendors go bankrupt and take their code with them. No, having source code access wouldn't necessarily guarantee an easy future for such customers, but not having the source code ensures that there is no future for the product and its long-term utility for the customer.
Savio Rodrigues suggests that source code access is "not all that it's cracked up to be." Try telling that to those that have relied on software only to find it, or its vendor, disappear.
In the cloud, it's even worse, as not only does the vendor disappear but so does all trace of its products. At least in my example above the customer had the perpetual right to the outdated code. In the case of the cloud the vendor's death is simultaneous with the code's demise.
Yes, cloud computing offers tremendous promise. It also has the chance to create significant peril for those that rely upon it. I therefore like the model, used by Loopfuse and others, that provides cloud/software-as-a-service-based software with the backup of an open-source license on that code to enable the code to outlive the vendor of it. Consider it a hedge on the longevity of the software service.
Disclosure: I am an adviser to Loopfuse.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
There's also the counterpoint, upgrade-itis. The cloud vendor upgrades their software, patches it, etc whenever it wants. What if they remove a feature that's critical to your business (but you were the only one using it)? There's no plan for I want to upgrade later. I know plent of people that are still happily running Office 2000/2003 however I doubt we'd see that in the cloud with offerings like Office 2007, OpenOffice and Google Docs.
Not to go off on too much of a tangent but with Google docs would there be any need for a cloud-based open office offering?
No one with any sense is going to put their business at risk by allowing another company to hold their data and allow their day to day productivity be determined by the status of their Internet connection.
"cloud computing" is a mindless buzzword for Internet based mainframe. In other words it is a pig and the buzzword is the lipstick.
Google Code has to accept the AGPL. That's the one that says that if you deploy an AGPL web app, you have to make the code available.
Dark whispers are that Google is balking at the AGPL because it's the one thing that could do to them what the GPL did to Microsoft. You're a journalist, please see if you can nail them on this question.
- by glamourati September 14, 2008 10:27 PM PDT
- It's a good point. The pros of the the cloud are enough to warrant figuring out how to mitigate risk as is done in any product. New PaaS companies like sullivansoftwaresystems.com/modbox have some innovative ways to address these issues.
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