Think we will ever see this?

[Chaos]

I prefer local storage and always will, but I'm fine with cloud storage as an additional method.  I doubt that it will ever outright replace local though, mainly because cloud has its own disadvantages.

Ahhh, Bioware and EA....you so crazy.

[Scotty]

I prefer local storage and always will, but I'm fine with cloud storage as an additional method.  I doubt that it will ever outright replace local though, mainly because cloud has its own disadvantages.

Ahhh, Bioware and EA....you so crazy.

Ah yes, the one person I knew would forever outright object to going to straight cloud storage.  The one thing I think a lot of us forget is that cloud storage is still a new concept, merely a couple years old at best.  I'm certain that eventually such archaic old DRM techniques will fade with time as local storage will.  Already, we have streaming cloud gaming, we have streaming cloud mp3 storage, we even have other concepts that encompass both local and cloud storage for things like games (ala Steam).  The goal is simplicity.  We want it simple, quick, efficient, and easy.  Look at the Amazon cloud storage for MP3's.  You sign up and get 5Gb free storage.  As soon as you buy any album (any, I bought a $3 EP album) you get bumped to 15Gb of storage.  Now I have an online storage for all my mp3's, as well as a good efficient player to listen to them.  No more frantically worrying over having a hard drive failure (*cough*), and if I have more than MP3's, they offer excellent and very cheap cloud storage for other files other than audio.

A lot of companies who provide software are going to the SaaS (Software as a service) model, where they host the service on their own servers, and the customer uses cloud computing to access the software.  It's working excellent for them, as they no longer need to invest in the infrastructure to host the software.  Nope, for a DRASTICALLY lower price, they can have their software hosted on remote clustered servers where when something goes down, their IT folks are the one's getting the call, the providers of the service are.  It's brilliant in so many ways.

We're a ways off to embracing with open arms.  There's a lot of things that still need to be standardized (either official, or best practice), such as security, confidentiality, and re-assurance that private information won't be compromised, but once the details are hashed out, we're going to find the cost of computing is going to drop drastically, as we no longer will have the need to spend thousands on a high-end computer, when we could just rely upon someone else's infrastructure, and amazing network connections.

EDIT: To better address your DRM concerns, with cloud computing, DRM is no longer necessary.  Sure, that may throw a thorn into the pants of those who would rather take the cheap route pirate games, but in due time, when network reliability improves (not saying this is happening tomorrow, or even in the next 5 years, which in due time, the cheap can stabilize as the economy improves), all concerns over DRM are irrelevant, since could computing ensures customer integrity.

[Chaos]

The article was merely acting as an example to shit going down, and suddenly you have no access to your own data.  Unless they manage to cover the entire planet in wireless internet access and can make sure their servers never go down, local storage will NEVER become obsolete, and thus we will never have solely cloud storage.

Yes, I freely admit that I do, and always will, prefer actually owning the things I pay for and having it available when I want it.  I agree that cloud storage is convenient, and that is why I approve of it in ADDITION to local storage.  Your suggestion of purely cloud storage is a ridiculous notion.  Why have one or the other when having both is both possible and far more convenient?  How silly.

[Scotty]

Your suggestion of purely cloud storage is a ridiculous notion.  Why have one or the other when having both is both possible and far more convenient?  How silly.

Your assumptions that humans are going to keep throwing money at home computers when reliable cloud storage and computing is a fraction of the cost and more convenient is even more so a ridiculous notion.  Is it convenient to have to constantly upgrade your hardware every couple of (or several if you aren't too concerned) years?  Is it convenient to throw in money for expensive external storage when it fails on you (*cough*) and you have no clustered solution that would otherwise result in no loss of data, having to go spend money on another one, when cloud storage is much easier and cheaper to use?  How often do you find yourself without internet now-a-days, when you need it?  How silly.

Let's put this into perspective on where the corporate mindset is at.  Let's take the dick of 'em all: Sony.  Had they come upon a cloud gaming solution, using their PS3 as a portal to access streaming gaming, they wouldn't have had to bat an eye at Geohot when he exposed its guts.  What will people be able to pirate?  Wanna take a stab at what they are probably going to be researching next?
I'll put another practical and quite real situation out.  Document storage (seeing as that is what I do).  Let's say you're a new business and you want a solution that is in-expensive, doesn't require a substantial IT staffing, you just want to have a document repository where your employees can log in, version control documents, check-in/out documents, etc...  Do you think any business who is capable of buying into cloud storage would rather say "Ya know what, no, we want to invest in our own data center, cut huge contracts with ISP's, increase our staffing to maintain this data center 10-fold, and increase our annual budget to incorporate growth, and spending on upgrades and maintenance."  The cloud solution would cost them a FRACTION of the cost of building up their own infrastructure, reliability and up-time no longer falls on their shoulders, it's the perfect solution.

I can clearly see that cloud computing and cloud storage is right in front of us, and there is already a lot of services out there who are going to it.  It's cost efficient for both huge corporations and personal use.  $3 dollars on Amazon got me 15Gb of storage for MP3's with guaranteed up-time (good luck taking down Amazon, Anonymous couldn't).  Best of all, it's cloud, so as long as you have a connection to the internet, you have no need to download the MP3's to your computer, you can listen to them via their web player.  Not saying everyone has internet everywhere, but I'll be damned if we haven't been getting there, and quick.

So the question is, when everyone goes to cloud, are you going to be that one person that says "I have my pager, I don't need no damn cell phone!"?  We'll see how long that lasts.

EDIT: To supplement this, I've added a couple of links to Amazon pricing for cloud services/off-site storage:

http://aws.amazon.com/s3/
http://aws.amazon.com/ec2/
MP3 cloud storage works on a $1/Gb/year model for additional storage.  I will correct my previous claims, you get 20Gb with the purchase of an album, not 15Gb.

[Chaos]

So the question is, when everyone goes to cloud, are you going to be that one person that says "I have my pager, I don't need no damn cell phone!"?  We'll see how long that lasts.

No, because that's the weakest and most inappropriate analogy I've ever heard.  Pagers and cell phones don't even do the same thing.  Pagers have no advantages over cell phones.  Typewriters have no advantages over computers.  Local storage DOES have advantages over web storage (incidentally, I'm referring to as what it is from now on, because !@#$ "cloud"), and that's where your whole analogy falls apart.  Your analogy ALSO falls apart because I have never once said that I refuse to use web storage, I just don't believe in falling for your hype when it is all so much bollocks.  You also keep talking about how, in the future, all this will be "so cheap" and "so wonderful" and "so easy", completely ignoring the fact that local storage will also be "so cheap".  Prices aren't going to fall for your precious web storage and not for any other computer hardware.  ::) 

You want to keep debating with me, get on the same page first.  You keep trying to argue with some strawman who believes that web storage will never catch on, and it's just a fad.  Guess what?  You can stop beating on the strawman, cause I'm over here.  I believe web storage will become very big, and it will become very useful.  I also believe that it will never make local storage obsolete because it has it's own disadvantages.  Actually, I think texting was actually a very appropriate analogy.  Has become very big, very useful, and yet, still doesn't replace the advantages of an actual phone call.

[Scotty]

Your analogy ALSO falls apart because I have never once said that I refuse to use web storage, I just don't believe in falling for your hype when it is all so much bollocks.  

Your assumption that I implied you would is where you fail.  You have to resort to games of words to defend your impending obsolete stubborn mindset, when you understood fully what I meant by my simple analogy.  Fine, I'll play along to humor you.  I merely asked whether you would insist on doing things the old fashioned way, when the times are progressing without you.  If you do, believe me, you'll be left behind when the corporate world doesn't care for "one man's" opinion on how local storage is still the solution (hence my reference to Lingus' mention of cell phones vs. pagers as a simple analogy that you are all too talented at over-complicating and attacking).  You won't have a choice in time.  When the world moves away from mass local storage, you'll have no choice but to follow.  Hell, can someone go to Best Buy and purchase a computer with Windows 97 because they feel that Windows 7 is just a fad and die off in time?  Feel free to keep arguing though, I'm sure corporations who set the industry standard on modern technology listen to you, that's their job isn't it?

You want to keep debating with me, get on the same page first.  You keep trying to argue with some strawman who believes that web storage will never catch on, and it's just a fad.  Guess what?  You can stop beating on the strawman, cause I'm over here.  I believe web storage will become very big, and it will become very useful.  I also believe that it will never make local storage obsolete because it has it's own disadvantages.  Actually, I think texting was actually a very appropriate analogy.  Has become very big, very useful, and yet, still doesn't replace the advantages of an actual phone call.

Humorous analogy.  I never once stated that cloud storage was an impenetrable monster that cannot be defeated, cannot have flaws, nope, never said it.  This is technology, and can best be defined as a "work in progress" with plenty of kinks and "gotchya's" along the way.  Of course computers are going to have to retain some form of local storage for caching purposes, temporary file storage, etc...  Tell me this Mr. "I lost my terabyte hard drive with all my pirated stuff on it when it crashed and burned", oh wait, nevermind, I think I just figured out why you are so argumentative.  Now, with cloud computing and storage, there goes your piracy, yeah, that would upset you wouldn't it?  So tell me then, why would any company that could possibly have their content pirated not want to have all of their services and products stored in the cloud somewhere?  From a business perspective, it ensures integrity of the customer.  Am I still talking to "the strawman"?

Yes? Ok, let's address your other concern that you are ever so vocal about.  You're so Hell bent that every software service provider is going to shit the bed on you, and the money you paid into their cloud service is going to go to waste, and you no longer have that service.  Guess what, it's better than buying Assassin's Creed II then not being able to play the game that you installed on your computer because some group of dicks is attacking their DRM servers, completely irregardless to the paying customers because they chose to pirate to "make a stand".  All that time spent with you pissing and moaning over how you can't play your game would be avoided should it be a cloud based game.  Now, you have no need to worry about whether your game computer can connect to another computer, to get to another computer, to get to another downed computer just so you can play your game.  I'll intervene for one second as to ensure you don't come back with some frivolous (as all yours have been so far) argument over wording and state that yes, I am well aware you don't do anything I just stated, nor what I will continue to say, and that it is to be read in a metaphorical sense for someone who has steady income and doesn't pirate as their only solution to obtain software.  Let's put it into real life perspective here, look at Amazon, their stock is absolutely ridiculous due to effective advertisement of their cloud based services.  They are being HUGE pioneers in providing cost effective cloud services.  If Amazon succeeds, do you think other companies... You know, I'm just gonna stop there with that point, as I've already beaten it dead, regardless of whether or not you are going to listen.  There's a reason they provide service for a subscription.  Now you can play games to try them out without purchasing the full game.  Didn't like it?  No worries, it's tied into your subscription, you can ditch it and move on to something else.  Like it?  Great, play it until the company goes bankrupt.  If the provider crashes and burns, closes down, and the servers come down, you can go to a different provider.  No need to go and drive to a store, purchase a game, come back, spend an hour (or more) installing, then updating once you install it (because God knows companies love to release half-ass products then patch them as soon as you start it up the first time) for another couple of hours, nope, you can just log in, and go.

EDIT: and one again, I will caveat everything I've said as to prevent you from further playing your games with words, that we are no where near getting to this point yet where we exclusively go to cloud storage and cloud computing.  We don't have the network reliability, and all this is based off the statistical evidence that one day skynet will rule the world and we will get killed off by robots that we've created to be too smart for their own good.

EDIT 2: If you care to further argue this, I am available to on any medium other than these public forums.  I've already clearly stated my stance more than once, and now that it is starting to take a more personal stance, I would rather not lock a perfectly good topic.  If you with to further this discussion, contact me somewhere else.

[ARTgames]

Are we playing guess the future still? I want another go. I think the majority of normal computer users will most likely move to portable devices. They will be slower and range from laptop to phone sizes. They will have a vast battery life and will always be connected to a network. Basically cloud computing.

But I don't think big powerful computers will die. They will still be there for people who make the content and software. Basically for businesses. And there will be a side market for computer enthuses.

[Lingus]

Chaos, I'm curious. It seems like you're talking about things from the standpoint of a home user. Considering you are a home user, is my assumption correct? When you say you don't buy into the cloud model, is it just for your own personal usage?

I'm only asking because I'm curious if you also see the benefits from the business standpoint. As Scott pointed out, there are many reasons why a business would want to switch from in-house solutions to a cloud based solution. I can see why a home user (at least at this point in time) would not be as inclined. A home user only has to keep one computer up to date (usually) and it's not that difficult to do. In addition, it is currently not an option to have all of your gaming cloud hosted. With that in mind, you still have to keep your home computer pretty well up to date if you want to use it for gaming. So no, cloud doesn't quite work for a home user... at least not for everything, not yet.

But, with that said, at least for simple things like email and document storage... well, we already have Google. It's already very possible to have those things hosted on the web. When it comes to that, the Pros definitely outweigh the Cons. It is far more reliable to use a web hosted solution than to rely on a single hard drive. The likeliness of losing all of your data hosted at Google is extremely low. Versus on your home computer, there's any number of ways for you to lose all of your data. And if you're worried about internet down-time, that's pretty temporary.

As far as cloud gaming, I'd have to agree. At least for the time being there isn't a solution for that and it's preferrable to have it on your local hard drive. But, I would bet that cloud gaming will probably take off pretty soon.

[Chaos]

Words words words.

U mad?

You seem to be the only one getting heated up about this, with your second edit making that more than apparent.  Because I don't buy into your "WEB STORAGE IS THE WAVE OF THE FUTURE, LOCAL STORAGE WILL BE OBSOLETE" hype, you're getting upset and throwing accusations?  Puh-lease.

@Lingus:  Yes, I can certainly see the benefit from a business standpoint.  I can certainly see the benefit period.  I don't know where people getting this idea that I'm wholeheartedly against web storage.  I just don't believe that it will outright replace local storage, and that is all I have said this entire topic.

Let me make that perfectly clear for everyone, especially a certain someone.


I am not against web storage.  I believe that it is a very beneficial technology.

I merely do not believe that it will outright replace local storage.

[Forum]

Yes, although i've never heard of terabytes and up .

[Lingus]

@Lingus:  Yes, I can certainly see the benefit from a business standpoint.  I can certainly see the benefit period.  I don't know where people getting this idea that I'm wholeheartedly against web storage.  I just don't believe that it will outright replace local storage, and that is all I have said this entire topic.

Sounds good.