I have arrived at the intersection of two thoughts.
Computing is on the cusp of a paradigm shift. Some say it has already happened, others say it is about to. No matter. There is a migration under foot, from homes and companies having their own infrastructure (PCs, servers, networks) to having it “in the cloud”. Amazon has redefined the economics of computing and it is starting to take hold. The basic premise is quite simple:
About a 100 years ago, everyone had to have their own energy source. The mill towns grew because the mills used water to drive the looms. Then came electricity. You no longer had to incorporate a power plant in your factory. Your power source could be thousands of miles away, managed by folks who make electricity for a living.
Now, your computing infrastructure can be thousands of miles away, managed by folks who have learned how to derive economies of scale in doing this infrastructure management thing. Just like electricity coming out of a socket changed the economics of energy, computing available through a broadband socket will change the economics of computing.
Indeed, the math works out. I have become a fan of Amazon’s services (and other cloud computing services as well) and certainly the economy is helping accelerate the trend.
It is with this background that I have been reading Taleb’s The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable. The Highly Improbable in this case would be an event that would impact Amazon (or another cloud provider). What could it be? Well, some kind of a physical breach but, more likely, some kind of a security breach. Of course, the instinct is to say maybe we shouldn’t go full-bore into Amazonia. Maybe we should continue on the path with higher costs and arcane procedures when everyone else is going the other way?
We have been here before. This time it will be different?
