Cloudy With a Chance of Computing: BoomTown’s NPR Debate With Harvard Law Prof Zittrain
by Kara Swisher
Posted on August 10, 2009 at 3:00 PM PT
This morning, BoomTown was interviewed on the very terrific National Public Radio talk show, “On Point,” along with Harvard law professor Jonathan Zittrain.
The program, moderated by Tom Ashbrook on Boston’s WBUR station, was titled “From Desktop to the Digital Cloud” and dealt with the increasing move of data of all kinds online and into the so-called “cloud.”
In other words, eventually, a completely virtual life for music, photos, records and more, and the end of packaged software.
Zittrain, who was co-founder of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society, also wrote the scary-sounding book, “The Future of the Internet–and How to Stop It”–a kind of ladies-lock-up-your-daughters title it’s hard not to love for its chutzpah.
He also penned an op-ed piece for the New York Times recently, with another corker of a title: “Lost in the Cloud.”
Some of the “real dangers” of the move to cloud computing that Zittrain cited in the piece: Losing control of data, losing data itself, privacy issues, federal government overreaching, even more nefarious governments abroad and a damper on innovation.
Zittrain is a smart cookie, to be sure, although I did not really agree with him at all on the show about pretty much any of his concerns.
For some non-cloud-friendly reason, WBUR does not allow me to embed the show here; you can listen to it in its entirety by clicking here.
Also, here is a posted response by Zittrain after the conversation, in which I failed to assuage him. He remains “still worried.”
Comments
In the words of Professor David Deutsch, “Problems are Soluble. Problems are inevitable”
No amount of precautions can avoid problems that we do not yet foresee. Hence we need an attitude of problem fixing, not just problem “avoidance”. And it’s true that an ounce of prevention equals a pound of cure, but that’s only if we know what to “prevent”. If you’ve been punched on the nose, then the science of medicine does not consist of teaching you how to avoid punches. If medical science stopped seeking cures and concentrated on prevention only, then it would achieve very little of either.
The traditional Enterprise IT world is buzzing at the moment with plans on how to stop Cloud Computing from entering into the workplace. It ought to be buzzing with plans to reduce the security and privacy risks associated with Cloud Computing. And not at all costs, but efficiently and cheaply. And some such plans exist, host-prood hosting[1], for example.
With problems that we are not aware of yet, the ability to put right — not the sheer good luck of avoiding indefinitely — is our only hope, not just of solving problems, but of making technological progress.
(the above is based on a talk by Professor David Deutsch on problem avoidance)
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Host-proof_hosting
Posted by Saqib Ali at August 11th, 2009 at 6:58 amI’m with you Kara. The opportunities and options for competition are so much greater today. Learning of the privacy fears we all experience doesn’t mean they weren’t always there. They were always there but little was available to uncover the abuse. The Kindle book retrieval issues proves we have a bigger voice and more protection than ever.
Posted by Mike Mohan at August 11th, 2009 at 8:38 am