Featured article by Calvin Paige, Independent Technology Author
Despite concerns about data security, privacy, and the reliability of cloud services, the level of innovation and market size of this pioneering technology show no signs of dropping any time soon. In this article, we take a look at the future of cloud computing and make a few predictions about how we’ll be storing our data a few years from now.
Computers Will Have Huge Storage Space – But it Won’t be Built-in
A few years from now, devices will have terabytes of storage space as standard features, but their hard drives and other storage may be the same size or smaller than today. With access to almost unlimited cloud storage, devices will be judged on their processing power, screen resolution, augmented reality (AR) functionality and the efficiency of their cloud syncing – not on the size of their on-board storage space.
For anyone who’s been following the development of tech from its infancy in the 20th century to today, the dawn of an era where storage ceases to be a deciding factor in choosing a device is more than big news – it’s almost inconceivable. For decades, hardware manufacturers were neck and neck, trying to create bigger capacity storage devices that were faster, more reliable and more affordable than previous models.
In the future, that innovation will be aimed at data warehouses, searchable archive systems, and cloud storage centers, while consumer electronics are freed from the need to have high storage capacity. This could result in a wave of ultra-affordable devices, as long as internet access and cloud storage is competitively priced and as long as data can be fully secured once in the cloud.
Cloud Computing Will Turn Software into a Service
Until recently, most businesses saw software a commodity that had to be purchased – without it, their high-tech computers wouldn’t do anything except run Solitaire and gather dust. The rise of cloud computing makes it possible to download software and use it in real time, or use a totally cloud-based application that requires minimal storage space on your device. For startups, cost-conscious businesses and entrepreneurs in the developing world, not having to buy costly software packages and deal with site licenses and incompatibilities will be a game-changer, as long as the fees charged by cloud-based software companies are competitive.
There are already freemium versions of several popular software packages, from Microsoft Office to Adobe Creative Suite, that offer a cloud-based monthly subscription at a fraction of the package’s purchase price. This gives users an opportunity to test out the software and only pay to use it for as long as they need to – it also eliminates the hassles of software piracy and fake user accounts that have cost tech companies millions over the past few decades.
Conclusion
Predicting the future of cloud computing is really the same as predicting the future of computing itself. With more and more services being hosted in cloud-based networks, there will be a time quite soon when nobody can avoid using this innovative technology.
