Google and cloud computing

[FrozenBacon]

Google originally started out as a search engine, but it expanded to provide various webservices that the avearge user uses everyday, such as gmail, google maps, and google documents. From my understanding, the general public thinks google is a company just dedicated to making a good web experience for the end user. Since they don't charge anyone to use their services, this does seem to be true, but google is still a company that earns money; rather well, I might add.

So how does google earn their money? Just like any other free service, ads. They just don't earn money for ads in the traditional sense. Businesses bid on ad spots, and pays up each time someone clicks on their ad. I don't really feel like explaining it so if you want more details you can watch the videos on google. The system seems like it is aimed to benefit the user, but it is a pretty effective way to ensure that someone clicks on an ad and the business pays for it. It is even moreso now since google has such an extensive index of the internet. It wouldn't surprise me if Google's creator had this revenue plan in mind when he was developing the searching algorithm.

So... what am I getting at here? Well, like I said earlier google has recently moved onto apps. It looks like Google's goal is to have the world move towards something called cloud computing, meaning all data is housed on the cloud that is the internet. A video of your child's first birthday may be on a server in lezpig, germany, while your photos of your last vacation is on a server located in des moines, iowa. The end user will just need to have a tiny net device that allows them to stay connected to the internet at all times in order to do anything. With services like onlive, you don't even need to have a computer to play video games. You could do all of your computing from a tablet PC.

Complete cloud computing is ideal for google because they would basically be able to index the world and generate a crazy amount of money from it. The apps they create for free forces companies to move in this direction. The fact that they charge the end user nothing keeps and their everyday workers are algorithms, any type of conflict is kept to a minimum. They could go evil and charge people for access to the data on the cloud, but that would spell their end quickly. Google has made smart moves over the years, I don't see them dong anything that stupid in the future.

I see your game, Google and it is a fine one. I, for one, don't want to make a move towards cloud computing. I am the type of guy who would create his own web server just because I would rather do everything for myself. There is also the fact that a world engulfed in a cloud would be a hacker's paradise.

Thoughts, comments, world ending conspiracy theories? How would you like a world where all your data is on the internet?

 

[madster111]

Cloud computing is like Communism.

It's a great theory, but it will end horribly in the real world.


Just wait until the day you need to print some files off to make the grade you need or get the business deal, and the server with all your data on it goes down.

 

[Daddio]

I saw a documentary done on Google, the first half of it was about how they got started and there 'lego computer' and then the second half talked about data farms, cloud data farms and the fact that they hold huge amounts of personal data that they 'protect' .. well, all the american government needs to do is yell "TERRORIST" and BAM! all our personal data at there fingertips.

Google isn't my concern, it's governments and the data they want.

 

[LinksOcarina]

The problem is that if all the data is in one place, it takes one hit, server crash, and we lose data and private information.

It is a real risky strategy.....not terrible in the sense you think of, but in the wrong hands it could lead to some trouble in the future.

 

[KoalaRainbowPoop]

i heard about this a whiles back. it's a scary thought knowing that your whole life may be one click away someday. bad enough google saves everything you search for and what pages you veiw the most.

 

[DocMoc]

I use Google Docs very often and I love it. As a student teacher, I write lesson plans at home and I just pop them up at school. No need to save to a memory stick that I can forget at home. I can also print the docs at school which saves me ink.

I'm happy with this basic form of cloud computing and would not use it for more than simple docs. Nothing confidential. Google won't get any sensitive information from my lesson plans.

 

[Rakon]

I don't really care that google saves what I search. If they want to spend tons of money on people sifting through my history to know what ads to put in front of me (which I then ignore), let them do it. My friend uses ixquick, which is decent. I wouldn't use Google if they weren't so efficient and helpful. I use the product I feel helps me the most, and when it comes to search engines, no one compares to google.