Putting A Figure On Cloud Failures: $71 Million Since 2007 As supporters of cloud computing, it’s expected of us to report on all the positive developments in this field, and as is obvious, there was, is and will be many of those. At the same time, as commentators with integrity, it is our duty to present to our readers negative news about cloud failures as well. As long time followers of this site will attest, we have done that consistently, some of my relevant articles (in chronological order) being: 1. Gmail Outage – Is Cloud Computing To Blame? 2. What
Amazon Cloud Outage
What Prompted Sony’s Move from Amazon to Rackspace? From HP’s announcement to invade its territory (See: HP Seeks to Give Amazon Competition with a New Public Cloud Service) to the loss of a big client, Amazon Web Services (AWS) is facing multiple challenges to its hegemony. While HP’s move may still be some weeks away, the decision by Sony Computer Entertainment America (SCEA), which manages popular games such as Grand Theft Auto IV and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, decision to move some of its cloud workload from AWS to Rackspace OpenStack will have immediate repercussions to revenue, and
Microsoft Azure Outage Blamed on Leap Year All of us will remember the fears associated with the Y2K problem, where computers’ inability to distinguish between the years 1900 and 2000 was supposed to create a slew of problems. Although problems were never as severe as some doomsday prophets predicted, often due to precautionary measures, there were some incidents that did affect normal life. Now, it seems that another date problem is to blame for Microsoft’s cloud outage late last month. 28 February saw Azure customers facing problems throughout the globe. According to Mary Jo Foley of ZDNet, “Azure problems began with an outage in the Windows
Amazon AWS – Small Bump In The Night Amazon AWS service was down for close to 25 minutes last night . Based on their status page: http://status.aws.amazon.com/ 7:39 PM PDT We are investigating connectivity issues for EC2 in the US-EAST-1 region. 7:50 PM PDT We can verify connectivity issues between instances in the US-EAST-1 region and the Internet. 8:03 PM PDT Full connectivity has been restored. The service is operating normally. Some of the more recognized companies affected by the outage were Netflix, Foursquare and Reddit to name a few. The 25 minutes of downtime is a lot more forgiving than it was
Cloud Computing – Threat or Opportunity? Part 1 Threat – an indication or warning of probable trouble Opportunity – a good position, chance, or prospect, as for advancement or success A new technology, a new way of thinking, a new environment, a paradigm shift – these are often threats to established players who dominate the landscape. However, these same things often offer opportunities for others to thrive. Consider the dinosaurs. While a meteor impact is considered the most probable cause of their extinction, scientists believe it is actually the changing climate in the aftermath of the impact that killed them. However, warm-blooded mammals began to flourish. In other words, the changed environment after the impact
Should You Be Concerned? A List of Recent Cloud Computing Failures – I “One swallow does not a summer make, nor one fine day.” – Aristotle (384BC – 322BC), Greek philosopher. Now, Aristotle’s sayings are as relevant today as they were 2400 years ago. In case you differ, consider what he had to say about the youth of his age: “The young people of today think of nothing but themselves. They have no reverence for parents or old age. They are impatient of all restraint. They talk as if they alone knew everything and what passes for wisdom with us
Did Human Error Cause The Amazon Cloud Computing Outage? “Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I’m not sure about the former.” – Albert Einstein (1879-1955), Famous scientist and Time’s Greatest Person of the Century. Amazon would like everyone to believe in the aforementioned quote. By blaming human error for the outage that left online businesses like Reddit and Foursquare hanging, Amazon can deflect flak from its technology. However, concerns still remain, and in spite of Amazon’s reassurances and its offer of a 10-day credit, there are valuable lessons to be learned here (See: Lessons from
