It amazes me that not more businesses are adopting Cloud Computing. With things like GMail and Google Apps available for free and rivaling the expensive desktop suites like MS Office why not use them? There are many reasons why some businesses choose not to use online applications.

Privacy

This is a huge hurtle for advocates of computing in the cloud. Business just don’t trust a 3rd party to host their sensitive email and business documents. This is for good reason too. There is no way to know 100% for sure that someone is not looking thorugh private communications.

That being said for non business uses cloud computing is perfect for the average internet user. You get access to your email and documents from anywhere in the world at anytime as long as you have an Internet connection.

Reliability

A debate broke out on Slashdot yesterday, as often does, in response to an article posted about recent outages of Google Apps and GMail. The article speculated these outages hurting the adoption of online computing. Some commentors strongly disagreed.

As the debate hit upon different arguments and angles the main discussion centered around GMail versus MS Exchange and which was better and more reliable from a business point of view. There were strong opinions on both sides which got me thinking…there is no right answer. No matter which you choose there will be trade offs. It just depends on your specific needs.

Here is a nice list of pros and cons for each choose. You decide which fits your needs and budget best.

GMail Pros

• FREE or just $50/user/year for premium accounts
• 24/7 access from anywhere with an Internet connection
• Solid reliability from Google’s enterprise data center
• Platform independant
• No overhead costs

GMail Cons

• Must trust Google to respect and protect your privacy
• No access if Internet is down, many fault points along the pipe

MS Exchange Pros

• No 3rd party privacy concerns
• More in control (or at least that is the illusion)
• 24/7 web access (some minor limitations)
• Access to stored emails and can send within network if Internet is down

MS Exchange Cons

• Expensive Windows and Exchange license fees
• Large overhead costs
  • Network administrator(s)
  • Servers and backup technology (data and power)
• Dependant on Windows (some may not care)

I am sure I have missed some points on all those list but those are the basics. You decide what you need and what you can afford to compromise on (financially and personally).