Into the cloud... and back onto a server farm.
Most of us these days who are tech savvy are using some sort of cloud based service or storage. I use Dropbox to keep everything synced and under control, Google docs, and cloud backup services for home. The recurring themes when talking about cloud storage and the digital shift always tend to be about convenience and privacy / security.
Let's look at convenience first, the ability to be able to access your information anywhere you have an internet connection is very attractive to people. Moving all, or some of your data to the cloud is pretty easy, and once it's set up, your life seems somewhat more organised.
Privacy always comes up, with people being cautious about having there information out on the internet that hackers can access. Although sites claim to be secure, they are still vulnerable. Like with most things on the internet, if you're using it, you should be able to access the risk.
This week in the tutorial we spent a good long time discussing ebooks, and the lengths book stores are going to to stay open. If you look at the recent closure of Angus & Robertson and Borders stores, you can see that the traditional economy is being affected by this new information economy. Although people will argue it's not the same experience as reading a real book, the numbers don't lie, and people are more concerned about instant access, and price when it comes to reading. When i first bought my Kindle from Amazon a few years ago, the postage was almost as much as the Kindle itself. Now, with a price drop, Woolworths is selling the Kindle in it's supermarkets. This just shows how much the ebook platform is being adopted, despite it's disadvantages.
I had never heard of cloud service until last week. I was not aware that people could back up their files on services such as drop box. It seems to be a pretty cool idea, and it definitely seems to be convient. Being able to access everything, even when you are not at home means there are no longer boundaries of what we can do at home, at the office, and even on the go. I guess we no longer have the excuse of 'I forgot my work at home' or 'I forgot my USB'.
ReplyDeleteOMG this was so weird! A Kindle at Woolies! It is sad that all these bookstores are shutting down, but it's because they are too attached to the old way of things, they need to adapt!
ReplyDeleteIf only Borders marketed the experience rater than the sale of books I think it would be a different story for them, and Angus & Robertson too.
Ahh money, money, money