Google CEO Eric Schmidt is credited with coining the term “cloud computing” for the first time in a public setting back in 2006. Ever since, tech companies everywhere have been incorporating the word cloud or some variation of it in all kinds of new projects (i.e. Juniper Networks’ Stratus, Yahoo! and Intel’s OpenCirrus, you get the picture).
But you’d be hard pressed to get everyone to agree on a definition. In fact, you might not even get one from some of the biggest players in the industry.
Oracle's CEO says cloud computing is nothing more than “gibberish” and “idiocy.” On the flip side, Michael Litchfield, a creative director at Omnicom Group's Doremus, calls it “accessible” and “maybe brilliant.”
Broadly speaking, cloud computing describes any information stored somewhere and then sent back to your screen – so pretty much anything accessible on the Internet.
Dell tried to trademark the term last year, and actually got it approved. But the company backed out after a lot of criticism that said it shouldn’t fall under one company’s control.
So before anyone claims to control the cloud, or even claim part of it, they better come up with a working definition first, as well as some agreement in the industry.
