Book discussion The Big Switch by Nicholas Carr

Sometimes a good non-fiction book can be even more engaging than a good fiction and such was the case for me when I read Nicholas Carr’s The Big Switch, Rewiring the World from Edison to Google. Nicholas Carr also wrote Is Google Making us Stupid?

This book provides an analogy between the development of electricity to the development of internet, computer applications and technology as a utility. Based upon this analogy we are on the precipice of seeing computer and internet services as ubiquitous. It is a new age that is both exhilarating for information junkies like me and can be extremely frightening as we consider the data gather capabilities and the privacy that we are giving up as we create a “web based” identity.
In Carr’s comparisons he views the Internet as follows:
1. As utility
2. As disruptive technology
3. Change to how we work
4. Change how businesses operate
5. Change in business models
a. What previously took 1000’s of employees now may only take a handful
b. Advertising—revenue is generated by clicks on ads not by content or service
6. Web content is not generated by “experts” but by users and amateurs and peer reviewed by users for credibility.

When Carr wrote this book Cloud Computing was not the buzz word of the day . Today there are many variations of defining this term:
Wikipedia: Cloud computing is a style of computing in which dynamically scalable and often virtualized resources are provided as a service over the Internet.[1][2] Users need not have knowledge of, expertise in, or control over the technology infrastructure in the "cloud" that supports them.[3]

IBM: Cloud computing focuses on the user, and offers highly efficient acquisition and delivery of IT and information services. Cloud computing is defined and characterized by massive scalability, superior user experience, and new, Internet-driven economics.

Martin McBrown’s Blog: Grids and cloud computing share many of the same features - large sets of computers that can be used to handle 'work'. The distinction between grids and clouds is that in a grid you tend to have a huge array of computers working on a single tasks or purpose..
whereas in a cloud the computing power is a general resource that we can use for pretty much anything.

Carr gives a fascinating illustration of how companies such as Flickr, YouTube, and others handle millions of videos, photos, and other media with relatively small staffs, accessing resources of companies such as I BM and Amazon, and demonstrated how these companies welcome their use. Second Life uses services from Amazon to manage their log-in services.
Reading this book you begin to notice a trend though. This means your activities in the “cloud” are not anonymous, not just with Flickr, YouTube, or Linden Labs. These service providers may be accessing and storing data on user activities in a variety of areas.

The world is changing, it seems at a quick pace, however it started with Edison and electricity as a utility.