"Network Solutions - Small business conversations and working together for small business success" - 2 new articles
Thinking of Ways to Ruin the Internet: The BasiliskLately, I’ve been trying to come up with ways to ruin the Internet. Not by using any means that would get me put on a terror watch list (targeting infrastructure is just so gauche), nor by counting on a well-placed comet or convenient thermonuclear cataclysm to bring about the end of civilization (which would presumably also take care of the Internet, though the spammers would probably find a way to survive, just to spite us). Instead, since we in the post-industrial West have gotten so dependent on the Internet, I’m looking at scenarios where society, as a whole, is scared, discouraged, or otherwise convinced to give up the Internet. Since this is squarely in the realm of science fiction, it’s only natural that we find a few examples waiting for us: * The Internet as a direct cause of sickness: The movie Johnny Mnemonic (which, other than the name and a few plot points, has practically nothing to with the original short story) brought us a debilitating “Nerve Attenuation Syndrome” (a.k.a. The Black Shakes). While there’s a modern day analog in those folks who claim they’re allergic to wi-fi (these people are collectively known as “whackjobs”), NAS was a sickness caused by technological society as a whole, rather than Internet usage in particular. But we’re on the right track. * The Internet as a vector of sickness: While the visual virus of Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash comes to mind immediately (a binary bitmap, resembling “snow” on a TV screen, that irrevocably crashed the brain of any computer programmer who looked at), a more interesting concept that predated it is the basilisk, introduced by David Langford in his short story BLIT. Named for the basilisk of mythology (a creature that killed with its gaze), Langford’s basilisk was an image, originally discovered in a fractal pattern, that the human brain simply couldn’t handle, killing anyone who viewed it. Simple enough to be spray-paint stenciled on walls, it also caused the transmission of images over the Internet to become a crime punishable by death, as noted in the notional comp.basilisk.faq, a USENET newsgroup FAQ set in a world where the basilisk is a real threat, the Internet is plain text only, and TV is a memory. The only real-world equivalent we have (and it’s a stretch) would be the use of images on “shock sites” (look it up in Wikipedia, I’m not even going to link the article, since even the written descriptions are gross), shown to unsuspecting users to freak them out. While the phrases, “I’m scarred for life,” “I hate you for showing me that,” “eye bleach” and “unicorn chaser” are often uttered by people exposed to shock sites, they still wouldn’t be able to bring Internet usage to a grinding halt, though they could, just like a Rickroll, devalue the link economy, albeit locally, temporarily — by training people not to click on links, you might slow the usage of the Internet, but nothing yet is going to roll it back. Not even spam. Until that comet hits, of course. Do you have a way to ruin the Internet? (Besides spam.) Leave a comment. How Cloud Computing Can Help Small BusinessesThese days one of the hottest topics in technology is the concept of Cloud Computing. The term “cloud computing” encompasses many areas of tech, including software as a service, a software distribution method pioneered by Salesforce.com about a decade ago. It also includes newer avenues such as hardware as a service, a way to order storage and server capacity on demand from Amazon and others. What all these cloud computing services have in common, though, is that they’re all delivered over the Internet, on demand, from massive data centers. “Cloud computing makes use of the excess server capacity of specialized providers. Work may be split among many machines, sometimes called virtual servers, that also work on the tasks of other individuals or companies. (Software-as-a-service, often confused with cloud computing, is a subset of it.) Cloud computing can help small businesses ease capacity issues and eliminating the need to invest in your own servers or employ staff to take care of them. Instead, you pay only for the capacity you need at a given time. And as demand rises, capacity increases without interruptions.” How does Cloud Computing apply to a Small Business?So what can be outsourced to the cloud? Just about all of your business computing needs. Some businesses and consumers simply use the cloud to host productivity applications, such as e-mail, document creation and sharing, and calendars, relieving them of the time and expense needed to run and maintain the software on their own computers. Some companies use it to host their own applications. But there are also entrepreneurs who use the cloud to sell services that would have been impossible to offer before, and those who capitalize on this model to build virtual companies. Sounds Great, but there are some CaveatsUsing cloud computing, in some sense, means giving up control—perhaps of your intellectual property, customer lists, or proprietary applications, depending on which tasks get outsourced. And vendors’ systems, like your own, can go down and you are essentially up the creek without a paddle. When you are using a traditional hosting package, you have the servers set up and occupying space, you are paying a fixed amount whether those servers are busy or not but you have complete control of the systems. This can be beneficial and more cost effective if you know your usage is more consistent on a month-to-month basis. So what Providers are out there for a Small Business?There are many more companies offering cloud computing services. You can choose from a wide range of providers and pricing, depending on the complexity of your tech needs and the amount of capacity you require. Amazon has something it calls EC2. Google has Google Apps, Google Docs, Google Sites, and Google App Engine. Microsoft offers a service called Azure. But there is a sizable group of smaller players as well. These include such companies as 3tera and 37Signals, one of the best-known small providers specializing in project management applications for entrepreneurs. More Recent Articles
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