Facebook (FB) founder Mark Zuckerberg announced in January that “the age of privacy is over” – not a comforting message from a man who oversees an Internet community with 400 million members. The occasion of this Orwellian assessment was FB’s plan to expose more member information on the Internet.
One of the things we learn as kids is that clouds can take on countless shapes. We know the forms we see are illusory – vapor masquerading as something substantial – but we keep on looking up into the sky, inviting the illusion and collaborating with it through our imaginations. Sometimes I think the name “cloud computing” is particularly apt. Like those in the sky, this cloud seems to change its form every time we look at it.
Every few months, someone who seems smart enough to know better predicts the imminent demise of the PC. The latest one to jump off a building thinking this tired forecast will fly him into prophetic genius territory is Google executive George Herlihy. As reported by siliconrepublic.com, Herlihy predicted that “in three years or so desktops will give way to mobile as the primary screen from which most people will consume information and entertainment”. According the article, this seems to be the party line at Google.