Mark Skilton

[Editorial Note: The author will be presenting at Cloud Expo New York (June 6-9, 2011), where his session is entitled "Monetization Strategies for Cloud Computing Services" and his co-presenter will be Penelope Everall Gordon of of 1Plug Corporation.] As the hot, new "trend of the moment" in technology, cloud computing is touted to be a transformative way to provide computing resources faster and more efficiently through shared infrastructures. Due to the considerable hype surrounding the Cloud, organizations considering cloud as an option will need to begin seeing that this new model does indeed offer improvements in cost, revenue and margins in order for them to gain buy-in from their executives to pursue the model. Because the lines of business and the IT departments in most organizations often speak different languages, it's critical for IT departments that are ... (more)

New Business Monetization Network Models – Google+ vs Facebook

A number of interesting issues have come to light in the recent announcement of Google+ intention to move into social networking in direct competition with Facebook. "Getting It" It may be that Google finally "gets it" with the idea of "circles" and "sparks" as a way of understanding social network segmentation that is superior to Facebook. Specifically the ability to segment different friendship groups into separate conversations is not just a grouping of relationship data but a fundamental "wakeup call" that this is how virtual communities actually work. It's often been surpri... (more)

Cloud Computing Drives Need for Open Standards

I recently looked back at some significant papers that had influenced my thinking on cloud computing as part of a review on current strategic trends. In February 2009, a paper published at the University of California, Berkeley, “Above the Clouds: A Berkeley View of Cloud Computing," stands out as the first of many papers to drive out the issues around the promise of cloud computing and technology barriers to achieving secure elastic service. The key issue unfolding at that time was the transfer of risk that resulted from moving to a cloud environment and the obstacles to security... (more)

Four Key Reasons to Include Cloud Computing in Your Business Strategy

The issue of success or failure in moving your company data, IT storage, servers or software to the cloud is often driven by technical issues, including performance, bandwidth, security and total-cost-of-ownership (TCO) considerations. While many of these factors are key criteria for selecting cloud solutions, they usually don’t align with the bigger picture that C-level executives must consider when adding new IT solutions. How IT can help sustain or create a competitive advantage has never been more apparent than today through the use of cloud computing. This technology boasts ... (more)