Google Outages Damage Cloud Credibility

Gmail was this morning ... again. Outages affected only a small percentage of users of Gmail, but as a result of Google News Tuesday off the lack of reliability from Google does not help to justify the feasibility of a comprehensive cloud.

Cloud in vogue. Vendors of all shapes and sizes race to move as many products and services as close to the cloud - Managed services and software as a service rather than traditional, locally installed applications.

There are many major players to invest in the movement of customers through the Internet. Amazon is offering cloud computing, and recently strengthened its more secure, private services are separated by a cloud. Microsoft provides a hosted online service performance, and recently launched technical preview of Office Web Apps, the delivery of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote from the cloud.

Google, probably the primary champion of cloud computing. Web is something that Google does. Google has an almost endless list of products and services, which are all delivered via the Internet from the clouds.

Google is not content
with dominating Web search and search advertising. She has a constant crusade to deliver business productivity from the Internet. Google takes Microsoft head to head in a number of markets, in order to wrest control from the desktop and move computing experience on the Internet.

This crusade had relative success. Many users and companies found that Google Docs can fill their office needs. Gmail can fulfill their needs in e-mail. Google Calendar provides planning. Google Talk provides instant messaging. Basic, Google has enough tools and services to meet virtually all the productivity and communication needs in the organization ... from the Internet.

The problem is that Google has repeatedly pointed questions, and interruptions in service. Here are just some of the headlines making off:
· September 24, 2009: Gmail outage

· September 22, 2009: Google News outage

· September 1, 2009: Gmail outage

· May 14, 2009: Google network outage

· May 18, 2009: Google News outage

· March 9, 2009: Gmail outage

· August 7, 2008: Gmail and Google Apps outage

These repeated outages damage the credibility of the cloud. Enterprises that are considering the pros and cons of moving office productivity or communications to the cloud have reason to be concerned when the poster child of cloud computing can't provide reliable availability.

The cloud offers many potential advantages for customers, but one of the biggest factors driving apprehension and impeding adoption is availability. Customers are reluctant to offload productivity and communication to the cloud if the possibility exists for the cloud to disappear. Productivity and communication are mission-critical aspects for businesses and reliable availability is not negotiable.

David Coursey summed it up nicely, stating "Rather than adding features that add only questionable value to our lives, such as Sidewiki and Fast Flip news, maybe Google needs to stop, take a deep breath, and focus on quality and reliability for products many of us use every day? "

Google can help improve the reputation of the cloud and further its own agenda to make desktop applications obsolete and move everything to the Web by ensuring that the products and services it provides are as reliable as they are functional.