[LINK] Webjet brings 'cloud' claims back down to earth

Bernard Robertson-Dunn brd at iimetro.com.au
Wed Feb 10 12:38:26 AEDT 2010


Webjet brings 'cloud' claims back down to earth
By Brett Winterford
Feb 9, 2010 12:30 PM
iTnews
http://www.itnews.com.au/News/166751,opinion-webjet-brings-cloud-claims-back-down-to-earth.aspx

Ah, no, that's not cloud computing. Sorry.

If ever there was a sign that the 'Cloud Computing' buzzword was 
confusing just about everybody outside the industry (let alone within 
it), Webjet managing director David Clarke today made it abundantly clear.

Clarke, who runs one of the country's most successful e-tailers, was so 
incensed by a story in the Australian Financial Review [paywall] 
claiming his company had signed a $3 million "cloud computer deal", he 
put out a statement on the Stock Exchange to refute it.

The story claimed that Webjet.com.au had ordered a "private cloud 
computing environment" for its web site and ticketing system.

But Clarke quickly informed shareholders that the "cloud computer 
description is not accurate".

Webjet owned all its own web servers, he assured them - some forty 
physical machines and 100 virtual machines.  The fact that they are 
"massively scalable" and managed within a third party data centre 
operated by Macquarie Telecom does not make it 'cloud computing', he said.

Clarke told iTnews that somewhere between Macquarie Telecom mentioning 
the word "cloud" in its press release to the AFR and the journalist 
writing the story, somebody "totally screwed up."

"Its gobbledegook headline stuff," he said.

"We won't be putting the core of our business in a cloud anytime soon, I 
can assure you."

iTnews has since witnessed the Macquarie Telecom press releases sent to 
the AFR, which uses the word "cloud" seven times.

Hot air

Clarke's comments reinforce the opinion of Longhaus analyst Sam Higgins, 
who controversially told iTnews in August 2009 that most vendors touting 
a 'cloud' solution were misunderstanding the term.

"When you scratch beyond their use of the word 'cloud', you find they 
are offering nothing more than the provision of virtual servers," 
Higgins said at the time. "They are not offering truly elastic computing 
power."

Under the virtual server provisioning model, the customer is allocated a 
pre-defined server image from the service provider, plus access to a 
control panel or interface for the managing of what the customer chooses 
to do with the virtual server. This, Higgins had said, is not cloud 
computing.

"Just because something is virtual, it doesn't instantly make it a cloud 
computing offering."

The confusion is exacerbated by the tendency for Software-as-a-service 
(SaaS) plays and Platform-as-a-service plays to also run under the 
banner of "cloud computing".

Higgins is of the opinion that for simplicity's sake, the 'Cloud 
Computing' term should only apply to "infrastructure-as-a-service" - raw 
compute power on demand.

-- 
 
Regards
brd

Bernard Robertson-Dunn
Canberra Australia
brd at iimetro.com.au




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