Friday, May 02, 2008

The Big Switch...A Great Read



The Big Switch by Nicholas Carr does a great job of explaining how the real growth in computing is shifting from the PC to the Internet. The PC is becoming less important as the "processor".

This month's Wired magazine has a great quote from Amazon's Jeff Bezos that summarizes what Nicholas conveys.

Utility computing is Web 2.0's version of rocket fuel. "You don't generate your own electricity," Bezos says. "Why generate your own computing?" The forces driving online apps — Internet bandwidth and reliability — also mean that, in terms of data per dollar, servers in your closet or colocation facility can't compete with industrial-scale bits piped in from hundreds, even thousands, of miles away.


Intro to The Big Switch.

A hundred years ago, companies stopped generating their own power with steam engines and dynamos and plugged into the newly built electric grid. The cheap power pumped out by electric utilities didn’t just change how businesses operate. It set off a chain reaction of economic and social transformations that brought the modern world into existence.

Today, a similar revolution is under way. Hooked up to the Internet’s global computing grid, massive information-processing plants have begun pumping data and software code into our homes and businesses. This time, it’s computing that’s turning into a utility.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

The Big Switch by Nicholas Carr does a great job of explaining how the real growth in computing is shifting from the PC to the Internet. check is out