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I see everybody around me moving to cloud, without really good explanation why. People just buy into the "cloud" marketing. They don't have the ability to thin

I see everybody around me moving to cloud, without really good explanation why. People just buy into the "cloud" marketing. They don't have the ability to think and reason, and so don't understand that "cloud" just means "renting someone else's computer." I built a complex in-house medical system. Quick, reliable, and liked by the users. I was in the middle of adding a major new feature when all of the management in the IT department quit. The new people immediately decided that the whole thing had to be "in the cloud." I was removed from the project, and they hired three people full-time to rebuild it. That was three years ago. The new system is still not online. The users are still using my old system, and the feature I was working on never got added because my presence and input was not welcome because I "don't understand the cloud." So I got moved to other projects. People talk about "the cloud" with the same fervor and language as members of a cult. And you will be an outcast if you dare challenge their way of thinking.

aurelianito 5y ago
Given what you explained, it seems to me that the cloud was an excuse given by the new overlords to just get you out off the way. Cloud is fashionable now, but any excuse would work for them. This seems to be a power grab.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  I don't think it's about power. Because of the way the organization is structured, I am isolated from the IT department. Moving me out brings no advantages to either part of the org. In fact, it's probably a disadvantage to IT because it has to burn three people from its allocated headcount. Where previously, it had a bonus person that didn't come out of the IT budget.
  - guhidalg 5y ago
    It's always about power and politics when bone-headed decisions like that are made. You correctly identified that _you_ did not report to IT, therefore _you_ were a threat to IT's power. Maybe you could have been re-orged under IT, but they probably saw you as a troublemaker who wouldn't kotow.
theirishgoodbuy 5y ago
At the risk of sounding cultish: I would argue “the cloud” is a bit more than just renting someone else’s computer. Hosting companies existed long before the “cloud”. The difference is the abstraction layer. I would define “the cloud” as a layer that abstracts away the physical infrastructure. (Which works until it doesn’t but that’s a longer comment.) You can even apply “the cloud” to your very own fleet of computers with the right software. Like I said in the original comment, it’s a specific solution to a specific problem. Whether it’s right for your system I have no idea.
- reaperducer 5y ago
  You can even apply “the cloud” to your very own fleet of computers with the right software. If it's on-prem, it's not a cloud, it's a fog. At least, that's what I've been calling some of my deployments.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
arinlen 5y ago
> People just buy into the "cloud" marketing. They don't have the ability to think and reason, and so don't understand that "cloud" just means "renting someone else's computer." It sounds you're trying to dismiss and downplay solutions to problems you're oblivious to. Even if you want to simplisticly frame "the cloud" as "renting someone else's computer", keep in mind that: * It's not one computer but as many as you'd like, and get them at the click of a button, * These are computers which are managed 24/7 by a team of highly trained specialists, * These computers can be located anywhere in the world and simultaneously in multiple regions, * These computers are designed to be fault-tolerant and handle (and survive) way more stuff that can conceivably be thrown at them. > People talk about "the cloud" with the same fervor and language as members of a cult. I'm sorry to say but you sound like you're militantly opposed to a solution to problems you either don't understand or refuse to understand. "The cloud", even when following the simplistic and clueless belief that it's just "renting someone else's computer", solves whole classes of technical and business problema that your box under your desk cannot solve.

aurelianito 5y ago

Given what you explained, it seems to me that the cloud was an excuse given by the new overlords to just get you out off the way. Cloud is fashionable now, but any excuse would work for them. This seems to be a power grab.

reaperducer 5y ago
I don't think it's about power. Because of the way the organization is structured, I am isolated from the IT department. Moving me out brings no advantages to either part of the org. In fact, it's probably a disadvantage to IT because it has to burn three people from its allocated headcount. Where previously, it had a bonus person that didn't come out of the IT budget.
- guhidalg 5y ago
  It's always about power and politics when bone-headed decisions like that are made. You correctly identified that _you_ did not report to IT, therefore _you_ were a threat to IT's power. Maybe you could have been re-orged under IT, but they probably saw you as a troublemaker who wouldn't kotow.

theirishgoodbuy 5y ago

At the risk of sounding cultish: I would argue “the cloud” is a bit more than just renting someone else’s computer. Hosting companies existed long before the “cloud”. The difference is the abstraction layer. I would define “the cloud” as a layer that abstracts away the physical infrastructure. (Which works until it doesn’t but that’s a longer comment.) You can even apply “the cloud” to your very own fleet of computers with the right software. Like I said in the original comment, it’s a specific solution to a specific problem. Whether it’s right for your system I have no idea.

reaperducer 5y ago
You can even apply “the cloud” to your very own fleet of computers with the right software. If it's on-prem, it's not a cloud, it's a fog. At least, that's what I've been calling some of my deployments.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

arinlen 5y ago

> People just buy into the "cloud" marketing. They don't have the ability to think and reason, and so don't understand that "cloud" just means "renting someone else's computer." It sounds you're trying to dismiss and downplay solutions to problems you're oblivious to. Even if you want to simplisticly frame "the cloud" as "renting someone else's computer", keep in mind that: * It's not one computer but as many as you'd like, and get them at the click of a button, * These are computers which are managed 24/7 by a team of highly trained specialists, * These computers can be located anywhere in the world and simultaneously in multiple regions, * These computers are designed to be fault-tolerant and handle (and survive) way more stuff that can conceivably be thrown at them. > People talk about "the cloud" with the same fervor and language as members of a cult. I'm sorry to say but you sound like you're militantly opposed to a solution to problems you either don't understand or refuse to understand. "The cloud", even when following the simplistic and clueless belief that it's just "renting someone else's computer", solves whole classes of technical and business problema that your box under your desk cannot solve.