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Comment by brown9-2 | Hacker News Reader

I don't think that the author of this article knows what "cloud computing" means.

So now "streaming songs from the internet" is covered under the "cloud" term as well? What isn't covered under this term?

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Technically streaming songs from the internet is cloud-computing as it is a form of SaaS. Just because the common definition is usually referring to a VPS or some kind of obvious SaaS(basecamp, salesforce) does not mean that it is not indeed cloud-computing.

Forgive my ignorance on the matter, as I'm not a web programmer and don't keep up with the relevant technologies, but what is the difference between cloud computing and the Internet, if this is the case? I mean, the finger protocol is arguably "software-as-a-service".

It seems more accepted that cloud is one of:

* IaaS (infrastructure as a service - think EC2, vps etc)

* PaaS (platform as a service - think GAE/heroku/engine yard, things with an API)

* SaaS (think salesforce, other more end user apps).

each layer (could) build on the one above it (perhaps I wrote it upsite down !).

And I think most people have problems with calling SaaS a "cloud". According to that definition, a hosted visitor counter you can embed on your website can be called "Cloud Counting", and that's nothing new.

Like most things, there really isn't much new, just distilled ideas, perhaps with some terminology that makes it easier to describe (or more catchy). But yes, SaaS isn't new at all.

I think that point is the "cloud" should probably refer to things like virtual instances where you don't necessarily care what physical box they are on (or they could be running on a 'cloud' of distributed machines rather than relying on a single machine, though I don't know if that actually exists).

The term fits here. Lala is more than just a streaming site. It has some of the features that the iTunes application offers. All your music could be stored in the cloud.

isn't the cloud the same as the web? I mean, before the term "cloud computing" where did people store their web mail?

Perhaps the term "web" is regressing to mean interlinked hypermedia, more so then a general term for applications built using the web + other technologies.

would "could storage" be more appropriate?

I feel like "cloud" is the new "P2P". While cloud hosting and peer to peer are both very interesting and useful technologies I think that many people don't really understand what these expressions really mean and overhype them a bit. Now this is not necessary a problem as I think a bit of hype helps technology to gain popularity as long as people in decision making positions keep a cool head and not start doing silly things ("Oh I know, let's make our e-banking service P2P/cloud/next cool trend based! I've read about in the Delta Airlines magazine!")

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