Unleash Tow Trucks on the Cloud Computing Super Highway

Defining ownership

With the migration of content into the cloud, what defines ownership is different from what we have traditionally understood. Take the recent brouhaha around Amazon's "seemingly" unilateral decision to remove an improperly licensed e-book on its Kindle reader, this could not have happened had you bought a physical copy.

While some have argued that there is a distinction between enterprise usage which focuses on value-creation and consumer usage which focuses on consumption, it feels artificial to me. After all, without consumption, there is no value to be created.

Possession vs Processing

If we look at the decades long battle between music industry and music pirates around the world, a reasonable conclusion is to say the (physical) possession-oriented way of looking at the world is no longer a viable option. Instead, the key value-creation is based on processes.

If this observation feels familiar, it is because the real world for most of us in the developed and late-stage developing countries is already there where service is a much more important part of the economy. In other words, it is nice to own assets, but it is what you do with your assets, tangible or otherwise, that really counts.

Can you drive a tow truck?

The emergence of Cloud Computing is making it easier for services to be added to the assets owned by enterprises and individuals. So, instead of trying to reconcile between Amazon zapping an e-book vs. physical ownership of the same, a more apt parallel could be the interaction with a tow-truck when your car is inoperative on the road where both sides follow a specific set of rules to obtain the desired service.

Does this mean that we should all aspire to be tow-truck drivers as vital service providers on the Cloud Computing Super Highway? Lest we forget that the real money is made by the auto insurance company who brokers the interaction between you and the tow-truck driver.

* A Cloud over Ownership: http://www.technologyreview.com/web/38391/?nlid=nldly&nld=2011-08-24