The Center for Information Management Studies (CIMS) and the Massachusetts Network Communications Council presented a workshop Thursday morning entitled Cloud Computing - What is it?  Who's using it and When? that brought together speakers from three high tech businesses to share their thoughts about what "cloud computing" is and how it is changing information technology management.

These are just a few of my notes that I took during the event and should not be interpreted as direct quotes or official statements by the speakers or the companies they represent.  This post is the first of three about this workshop.    

Burton Group
Chris Howard, VP and Service Director and Jack Santos, CIO Executive Strategist

Key characteristics that distinguish what we call "cloud computing" from the existing internet:
Architectural models
Consumption models 
Flexible services 
Billing models

Portfolio management is critical to differentiate the commoditizable pieces within a business' IT architecture that are suitable to be offloaded to the cloud from the integral, strategic pieces that may not be suited for the cloud.

Many businesses would benefit by creating internal "clouds" to gain experience developing modular, inter-operable, scalable applications first, and then use those insights to select which elements to transition to the cloud - avoid a "mess for less" scenario.  

The challenge for businesses now is to map their business architecture and technology architecture at the same time to make effective use of the benefits available through cloud computing.     

Some other resources mentioned during their presentation:
http://www.bastionhost.com/ - a Canadian company that is re-purposing cold-war era bunkers in N. Scotia to create data-centers
http://verizonbusiness.com/ - Verizon Business announces a $5m contract to provide NATO's C3 with Virtual Private Networking Capabilities

Executive Summary

The proliferation of mobile device usage, in combination with the tremendous growth in web‐based social networking, has opened business opportunities for companies like Loopt, uLocate, Google, and Helio. These four companies are front‐runners in a new geosocial networking arena, building business models tying together the mobile web, location‐based software, and online social networking. In analyzing these  companies, the following guidelines were uncovered for other companies interested in building businesses in geosocial networking services: 1) establish and participate in a strong value network; 2) create a framework to promote rapid development ofpositive network effects; and 3) create a monetization strategy that is sustainable and flexible. [click to download]

Alan Belniak, Katrina Gosek, Jon Lucas, Allan Vainstock

I attended my last class session of my MBA last night.  I’ll have to admit that it was bittersweet.  On the one hand, I’m looking forward to having one (or more!) night/s a week spent at home with my family or friends, as opposed to reading cases, working on projects, etc.  On the other hand, though, I really liked the entire process - all 32 months of it - because it taught me to or helped me think in new ways.  And the exposure to new material, good guest speakers, and great classmate viewpoints was a great benefit.

To read more, go to http://subjectivelyspeaking.wordpress.com/2009/04/28/you-must-be-prepared-to-wander-in-order-to-wonder/