Daily Archives: June 3, 2017

Will Commodification Hurt Amazon’s Cloud Computing Business? – Forbes

Posted: June 3, 2017 at 1:03 pm


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Will Commodification Hurt Amazon's Cloud Computing Business?
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Will the profitability of AWS (Amazon Web Services) decrease over time (to near zero) because the service is basically a commodity? originally appeared on Quora: the place to gain and share knowledge, empowering people to learn from others and better ...

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Will Commodification Hurt Amazon's Cloud Computing Business? - Forbes

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The 3 dumbest things enterprises do in the cloud – InfoWorld

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Youre going to make mistakes. I tell my enterprise clients that every week.

However, there are mistakes and there are mistakes that are more like self-inflected wounds. Here are three of the dumbest mistakes Im now seeing enterprises make in the cloud efforts.

When helping clients plan their cloud efforts, I regularly hear, My data is sacred, so we dont want to put our data in the cloud. However, were paying too much for compute and datacenter space, so lets place that on some public cloud.

That is not a good move for a couple reasons. First, youre going to hit a great deal of latency. In fact, Ive never seen this kind of hybrid architecture work due to the lags. Second, security becomes way more difficult. In fact, you typically end up with more vulnerabilities.

Enterprises typically change their budgets around the use of public clouds, and publicly traded companies typically dont want to have any upticks in expenses even during transitions. For cloud migrations, they budget for a zero sum game, and to do that they get rid of the staff that looks after the legacy systemsbefore moving the workloads to the public clouds.

Thats a huge mistake. Typically, significant cloud migrations take a year or more. Youre going to need your legacy systems during that time to run the business. So you still need your legacy staff for a good while. Moreover, youre never going to completely get all your applications on the public cloud. Many applications should not move due to their economics, and others cant move due to some limitations in the technology. So you still need some of your legacy staff for the long term. Youll still save, but only over the longer run.

My, how the pendulum has swung! The people in enterprise IT who pushed back on the cloud just a few years ago are now aggressively embracing it. They see the writing on the wall.

But in a hype-driven frenzy, they are overstating the ROI that public cloud computing will bring. As a result, they are falling short in the eyes of the enterprises leadership.

The truth is that the mileage you get from cloud computing varies a great deal. Thats why I spend a great deal of time on the business case to tell enterprises exactly what they can expect. You have to do that, too.

David S. Linthicum is a consultant at Cloud Technology Partners and an internationally recognized industry expert and thought leader. Dave has authored 13 books on computing and also writes regularly for HPE Software's TechBeacon site.

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The 3 dumbest things enterprises do in the cloud - InfoWorld

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CIOs and factors overlooked when changing your cloud – Cloud Tech

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By Clint Gilliam, Virtual CIO, GreenPages Technology Solutions

The topic of cloud computing currently ranks in the top-five of IT articles published for IT professionals. Daily we hear about the benefits of this new world, the range of exciting new services now available, and of course how to make the transition.

Even with the valuable insights provided by these articles, there is one critical aspect given too little attention or even overlooked entirely. Specifically, how to plan for a breakup.

If one accepts the old dictum that change is the only universal constant, then ask yourself why most people do not plan as carefully for unwinding a cloud / SaaS arrangement as we do in setting one up. The details of ending an arrangement can be tricky and not immediately self-evident.

These issues are beyond standard legal provisions for exit clauses, terms/conditions, and related matters. It deals with practicality and preparedness.

Take this as an example, imagine you use a SaaS system to implement secure e-mail for corresponding with people outside your organization. Even in the world of TLS, many still have a need for such services which provide mailbox-to-mailbox encryption for both e-mails and attachments.

Should you decide to terminate this service, you might be in for some unexpected challenges. If your service provider does not provide bulk decrypt and export tools, you could be in for a painful process.

In a previous role, I ran into this exact situation. We had to write custom scripts to go through each mailbox e-mail-by-email to unencrypt and export; it was slow and costly.

Even without terminating the service, data exporting tools can be useful as a course of normal business. Consider the situation when your organization is involved in litigation. As part of the legal Discovery process, you might have to produce e-mails for individuals covering specific subjects and dates. Should the list be significant or the filters complex, you can again run into unexpected workloads.

Another example is data offloading. Many services, AWS included, offer excellent tools for migration / uploading large volumes into their cloud services. In some cases, particularly with large datasets, such approaches are the only feasible or timely solution.

But what happens when you elect to move those datasets to another cloud provider? Dont assume the comprehensive set of options you have for bringing data into your providers cloud is symmetric. You might just find a long slow process to make a change.

In both examples, specific industry or regulatory requirements such as security, data location, and privacy can compound the challenge.

IT professionals have a lot of experience with managing proprietary solutions and data. The key is leveraging that knowledge when considering cloud-based solutions. Personally, I have found two methods for reducing these risks.

The first is to run some tabletop simulations on what happens in various scenarios, to develop and expand your punch list over time. Scenarios to consider might include migration, legal requests, disaster recovery or other matters specific to your industry.

My second approach is to network: it is a knowledge and experience multiplier thats second to none. Check with colleagues; get their advice and listen to their own experiences.

Of course, you dont know what you dont know, but thinking of the end, as well as the beginning, should put you in a better spot.

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Team develops first blockchain that can’t be hacked by quantum computer – Siliconrepublic.com

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It was a busy week for IoT technologies, with Russia preparing its networks for quantum computer hacks through blockchain.

Earlier this week, Irish forestry organisation Coillte revealed its latest effort to get into the internet of trees space following a 1.2m deal with the European Space Agency to roll out a tree growth analytics system, including a unique tree sensor device.

When operational, the sensors will create a kind of mesh network that maps out a digital forest. The resulting data will be transmitted via satellite to provide real-time analytics for forest managers.

Meanwhile, across the Atlantic Ocean, Android co-founder Andy Rubin was discussingthe prevalence of smart home assistants on the market, and how they are creating a disjointed ecosystem.

Rubin wasspeakingas part of thelaunch of Androids new Essential Home device and a new open source, smart assistant operating system called Ambient OS.

All of these [companies] have ecosystem envy and want to create their own ecosystem, Rubin said.

But consumers dont want just Samsung stuff in their house. They want diversity.

The fields of blockchain and quantum computing are fascinating and complex in their own regard, but new research from Russia claims that a merger between the two could be very interesting.

According to the International Business Times, a team from the Russian Quantum Center in Moscow has developed quantum blockchain technology that would prevent any hacker from accessing connections, despite thecomputing technology still being experimental.

As has been explained before, blockchain is the technology that makes a transaction of currency or information traceable and transparent to both parties and, by its nature, is supposed to be incredibly secure.

However, when quantum computers enter the mainstream, this might not be the case as their incredible processing power would be able to crack any encryption.

Parties that communicate via a quantum channel can be completely sure that they are talking to each other, not anybody else, said Alexander Lvovsky, group lead ofthe research.

This is the main idea. Then we had to reinvent the entire blockchain architecture to fit our new authentication technology, thereby making this architecture immune to quantum computer attacks.

Earlier this week (29 May), Enterprise Ireland held a trade mission in Canada with a focus on IoT, led by Minister Sean Canney, TD.

The biggest success at the event was with Clare-based Tekelek, whichsigned a $1.4m deal with PayGo, a company that provides sensors for businesses to monitor fuel consumption remotely and make changes where necessary.

As part of the deal, Tekelek will begin developing an intrinsically safe sensor to facilitate the expansion of PayGos service offering in the US and Canadian markets.

Oliver McCarthy, general manager of Tekelek, said: Were very excited to apply this thinking and our technology to the industrial fuels marketplace, and were similarly pleased to partner with an organisation of PayGos calibre to bring our technologies to the North America market.

Dublin City Councils (DCC) Smart Dublin initiative has announced a partnership with the Connect Centre and Intel to deploy low-cost sensors across the capital to monitor rainfall, weather conditions and river levels.

The new sensors will communicate data wirelessly to DCCs operations team, which will analyse water levels and use Connects Pervasive Nation IoT network to provide city authorities with an early warning of potential flooding.

Jamie Cudden, DCCs Smart City programme manager, said: Dublin is emerging as a leading location for smart city and IoT innovations.

Intels Dublin Living Lab programme has already carried out some initial flood monitoring activity across the city, which has led to the prototyping of a set of river and rainfall sensors.

Autonomous cars are gradually heading onto our open roads, albeit with a driver behind the wheel to make sure everything goes OKduring the trials.

Now, anew method of testing these cars developed by the University of Michigan may have found a way to drastically cut the amount of time it could take to make them road-legal.

Developed using data from more than 40m km of driving in the real world, a team of researchers believes that they can save 99.9pc of the testing time and costs with their system.

The evaluation process breaks down typical driving situations into components that can be tested or simulated over and over again, exposing autonomous vehicles to a condensed set of the most challenging driving situations.

This, the researchers argue, means that 1,600km of testing would equate to 1.6m km in real-world testing, but, in order to make the public feel safe being in these vehicles, as much as 20bn km of testing will need to be done.

The teams white paper is published here.

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Donald Trump to Pull U.S. Out of Paris Climate Agreement …

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Updated: May 31, 2017 10:27 AM ET

President Donald Trump has told aides he intends to pull out of the Paris climate agreement , throwing into doubt a landmark treaty that scientists have said is vital to combating global warming .

According to two White House officials, the President has not yet decided on how to withdraw from the agreement either through a multi-year formal process or the more extreme act of quitting the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The aides cautioned any decision isnt final until it is announced, and that the President is still being lobbied by others to remain in the agreement.

Amid multiple reports that he had decided to withdraw, Trump said an announcement would come soon. "I will be announcing my decision on the Paris Accord over the next few days," Trump said Wednesday morning on Twitter .

Trump made withdrawing from the agreement, negotiated by former President Barack Obama in 2015, a central focus of his campaign, arguing that it overburdened U.S. consumers and energy producers with carbon pollution limits that didnt apply to developing economies. But since he won the White House, the decision whether to fulfill that promise has been among the most fraught within his administration, dividing the Trump family and top aides along ideological and nationalistic lines.

Trump has also been the subject of ferocious international lobbying from leaders across the globe to remain in the agreement. The subject was a centerpiece of the G-7 meetings in Italy last week, where the leaders failed to reach consensus on climate issues because of Trumps dissension. Trump was also pressed by Pope Francis to remain in the accord, and the Pope gave Trump a copy of his encyclical on climate change. All signatories to the UN climate change treaty have signed onto the Paris accords except for Syria and Nicaragua.

Obama entered the agreement without seeking ratification from the GOP-controlled Senate, making it easier for Trump to quit the agreement.

Within the White House, the divisions tend to break along increasingly-familiar lines: Scott Pruitt, the Environmental Protection Agency administrator, and chief strategist Steve Bannon favor pulling out, while Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Director of the National Economic Council Gary Cohn and senior advisor Jared Kushner are all reportedly in favor of staying in. Withdrawal would allow Trump to fulfill a campaign pledge and may appeal to supporters of his inward-looking "America First" platform. But policy experts warn of the potentially significant downsides, including ceding global leadership on climate policy to China and Europe.

Trump could also adopt a third option. Since many of the nation's commitments to the Paris Agreement are voluntary, there are no concrete penalties if the U.S. fails to meet them. As a result, Trump could change U.S. commitments, preserving its role at the table while adopting less-stringent greenhouse gas reduction targets than those set under the Obama administration. Trump has already said that he will cancel U.S. payments to a UN fund dedicated to supporting climate change initiatives in the developing world.

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Does Donald Trump Still Think Climate Change Is a Hoax? No One Can Say – New York Times

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New York Times
Does Donald Trump Still Think Climate Change Is a Hoax? No One Can Say
New York Times
WASHINGTON As a businessman, President Trump was a frequent and scornful critic of the concept of climate change. In the years before running for president, he called it nonexistent, mythical and a a total con job. Whenever snow fell in New ...
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Donald Trump’s Latest Approval Ratings in Election Swing States Reveal How Unpopular He Has Become – Newsweek

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The country as a whole isn't thrilled with President Donald Trump's job performance. Andin general,the same goes for the swing states that helped him win the presidency lastNovember, according to the latest polls.

A handful of key states where both candidates seemingly had a shot at winning allowedTrump to shock the country and win over Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. Michigan was one such state. Trump narrowly edged outClinton, earning 47.6 percent of the vote to her 47.3 percent. A paltry 11,612 votes gave the former reality star Michigan's 16 electoral votes.

A littlemore than four months into his presidency, Trump isn't exactly beloved in Michigan. Only 37 percent of likely voters in the state view him favorably, according to a new poll released byEPIC-MRA this week. Fifty-three percent viewed Trump unfavorably to some degree, while 44 percent of voters viewed the president very unfavorably. And that's not the worst of it.

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Just 35 percent of likely voters gave Trump a positive job performance rating, while 61 percent gave him a negative rating, according to theEPIC-MRA survey. The poll interviewed 600 likely voters in Michigan from May 20 through May 24. It had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

U.S. President Donald Trump refers to amounts of temperature change as he announces his decision that the United States will withdraw from the landmark Paris Climate Agreement, in Washington, U.S., June 1. Kevin Lamarque/File Photo/Reuters

Things weren't much better for Trump in Pennsylvania, another swing state he won by a small margin (a bit more than 1 percentage point). Just 37 percent of Pennsylvania voters approved of Trump's job performance, according to a May survey from Franklin & Marshall College.

While Michigan and Pennsylvania proved to be close races in November'selection, Trumpwon North Carolina over Clinton by nearly 4 percentage points. Butthe southern swing state's approvalwasn't great inApril,the last time it was measuredby a survey. Only41.6 percent of voters approved of the job Trump has done after 100 days in office, according to the poll from Elon University. Nearly 51 percent disapproved of his job performance.

"Though President Trump enjoyed considerable support among North Carolinians on Election Day, he has lost ground among the crucial independent voters responsible for his success over Hillary Clinton,"Jason Husser, director of the Elon University poll, said in a statement at the time.

The survey, which had a margin of error of plus or minus 4.36 percentage points, interviewed 506 likely votersfrom April 18 through April 21.

It's unlikely that Trump's standing has improved in the month or so since the North Carolina poll was released. A flood of controversiesmost notably the avalanche of bombshell reports relatedto the firing of former FBI Director James Comey and the Trumpadministration'spotential ties to Russiahave not been kind to the president's national approval rating. In late April, the FiveThirtyEight weighted average pegged Trump's national approval rating at about 42 percent. It has since fallen to 39.1 percent.

State polls are taken far less frequently than national surveys, but the local resultsin generalhaven't been good for the White House. A March Marquette University poll ofregistered voters in Wisconsina swing state Trump won by just 1 percentage pointfound Trump's approval rating stood at just 41 percent, while 47 percent of the state disapproved of the job he was doing. A Florida poll from the same monthpegged Trump's approval at 44 percent in the state, with disapproval at 51 percent.

Even in Texas, a state Trump won with ease, the president's approval rating appears to be deeply underwater. Only 42 percent of Texans approved of the job he was doing, compared with 54 percent who disapproved, aTexas Lyceum survey found in April.

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Donald Trump's Latest Approval Ratings in Election Swing States Reveal How Unpopular He Has Become - Newsweek

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Kathy Griffin breaks down, says Donald Trump ‘broke me’ – ABC News

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A tearful Kathy Griffin spoke out in response to backlash after she posted a short video of herself holding a decapitated likeness of Donald Trump's head -- saying that the president "broke me" by calling her stunt "sick."

The photo that Griffin posted sparked an immediate and widespread backlash as well as condemnation from the president, who called her actions "sick" in a tweet. First lady Melania Trump called the image "disturbing" and said it makes you wonder about the mental health of the person who did it."

"I'm gonna be honest, he broke me," Griffin said Friday of Trump's response. "I may get arrested today, I dont know."

The comedian said she is also getting "detailed death threats."

"This is America, you shouldn't have to die" over comedy, she added.

In the photo, which Griffin tweeted on May 30, then took down, she captioned herself holding up a fake Trump head, covered in fake blood, "I caption this 'there was blood coming out of his eyes, blood coming out of his ... wherever,'" referring to an exchange between Donald Trump and former Fox News anchor Megyn Kelly during the presidential primary season.

Griffin's First Amendment lawyer, Lisa Bloom, said that the Secret Service reached out to her and that she had to retain a criminal attorney as well. Griffin maintains she was not threatening the president.

Griffin explained that her and photographer Tyler Shields only spent five minutes coming up with the idea and that the pictures were part of a larger photo shoot that didn't include Trump.

The picture was never meant as anything malicious and that it was supposed to be interpreted in different ways, she added.

"I have no desire to threaten him," she said. "I made a horrible mistake and made a horrible call."

When talking about the aftermath of the pictures, Griffin said "I dont think I have a career after this." She was recently let go from CNN's New Years Eve special and added Friday that at least five concert venues have already canceled some of her shows. The most recent cancellation is her June 17 appearance at Uptown Theatre Napa in Napa, California, which made the announcement on Friday on its Facebook page. No reason was given for the cancellation.

The 56-year-old comedian also spoke about the tweets in response from Trump himself, calling the act "sick" and from the President's wife Melania, which focused on their son Baron's well-being.

"Kathy Griffin should be ashamed of herself. My children, especially my 11 year old son, Barron, are having a hard time with this. Sick!" Trump wrote the morning after the picture started trending on the internet.

Bloom said that Griffin couldn't have imagined that her stunt would be misinterpreted and that other artists have done worse.

"I'm not afraid of Donald Trump ... I'm gonna make fun of him more now," she said Friday.

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Kathy Griffin breaks down, says Donald Trump 'broke me' - ABC News

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This week in Donald Trump’s conflicts of interest: More drama about China – Salon

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President Donald Trumps conflicts of interest have managed to center around China with unusual frequency this week. Lets dive in.

President Donald Trump has issued ethics waivers for four ex-lobbyists

This story practically speaks for itself. Trump, the man who made drain the swamp into a slogan during his 2016 presidential campaign, has issued 17 ethics waivers for people working for either him or Vice President Mike Pence. Of those 17 waivers, four have gone to former lobbyists three staffers at the National Economic Council and the chief of staff for Pence himself.

Chinese activists go missing when investigating Ivanka Trumps factory

Its scary enough that two Chinese activists investigating labor abuses at one of Ivanka Trumps Chinese factories have gone missing, while a third was arrested. Making matters worse, however, is the fact that this may have had to do with the Chinese governments desire to remain on the Trumps good side. As China Labor Watch director Li Qjang told The Guardian, he believes the activists may have been targeted because this factory makes products for Ivanka Trump, so now this situation has become political and very complicated.

Jared Kushners family uses Trump to promote more investments to Chinese businessmen

In less sinister China-related news, Bloomberg reportsthat a Jersey City apartment project being developed by Murray Kushner, the uncle of Trumps son-in-law and adviser Jared Kushner, was pitched to Chinese investors in a way that explicitly referenced the familys connections to the president. Although Jared Kushner himself wasntinvolved in the project and Kushner Cos. sent a cease-and-desist letter to Murray Kushners company when they heard about the pitch, the fact that this pitch occurred at all speaks to how those connected with Trump are seeking to cash in on his presidency.

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Donald Trump Signs Bills Assisting Law Enforcement: ‘We Are Behind You 100 Percent’ – Breitbart News

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We are here today to reaffirm our unbreakable support for the American heroes who keep our streets, our homes, and our citizens safe, and theyve been doing an amazing job under very adverse conditions, Trump said during a signing ceremony at the White House.

Trump signed thePublic Safety Officers Benefits Improvement Act, a bill to help streamline benefits for disabled officers and the families of fallen officers.

For too long, injured officers have suffered, and the children of fallen officers have put their dreams of college on hold while bureaucracy delayed crucial benefits, made it impossible for their families, Trump said. No longer. Its unacceptable, and its going to end today.

Trump also signed the American Law Enforcement Heroes Act, a bill allowing federal grants to help military veterans transition to careers in law enforcement.

America is proud of our veterans, and I think I can say a double proud or a triple proud, he said.

Referring to his decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement, Trump joked that the two bills he signed Friday were slightly less controversial than yesterday.

Several members of the law enforcement community joined Trump in the Diplomatic Reception Roomfor the signing ceremony, including representatives from the Fraternal Order of Police and the National Sheriffs Association.

Law enforcement officers from Maryland, Pennsylvania, Ohio, California, and Virginia were also present.

When a home is threatened, when danger visits our doorstep, when innocent lives are on the line, Americans turn to their courageous officers of law enforcement because we know they are here to serve and to protect us all, Trump said, thanking them.

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Donald Trump Signs Bills Assisting Law Enforcement: 'We Are Behind You 100 Percent' - Breitbart News

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