What Do You Do When the Cloud Shuts Down?

jbrodkin writes "Can you trust your data to the cloud? For users of an online storage service called The Linkup, formerly known as MediaMax, the answer turned out to be a resounding 'no.' The Linkup shut down on Aug. 8 after losing access to as much as 45% of its customers' data. 'When we looked at some individual accounts, some people didn't have any files, and some people had all their files,' The Linkup CeO Steve Iverson admits. None of the affected users will get their lost data back. Iverson called it a 'worst-case scenario.'"

Comments

Backups, backups, backups!

[morgan_greywolf]

Like anything else, including local technology, the key is to create a backup strategy. The cloud creates special problems for performing and managing backukps, so you need to understand your chosen compute or storage cluster provider's options, as well as other options specific for your application in regards to backups.

Re:Backups, backups, backups!

[morgan_greywolf]

No kidding. Why do you think I said 'backups' three times in the subject line? ;) That's what I mean by a 'backup strategy' -- backup strategies, which are sometimes called 'disaster recovery plans', though that's really a bigger plan that includes a backup strategy, include making multiple redundant backups, offsite storage of backups, considerations for multiple different media, etc. There are several 'best practices', but the best strategy is going to be different for each company or department and often even for each application.

The best thing to do is to examine what kind(s) of data there is in the set, how large that data set is, how often that data gets updated, how often it needs to be accessed, and what are the potential costs for losing a day's, week's, month's, year's etc. worth of that data. That will point you in the direction as to frequency of backups, types of backups, etc.

Offsite backups are essential for any data requiring backup.

Re:Backups, backups, backups!

[bjk002]

"No kidding. Why do you think I said 'backups' three times in the subject line?"

I think he was just backing up your statement!

Backup, Storage

[Cytlid]

I can't believe this article. The number of places you store your data is directly related to the level of which it's important to you. People put all their data in once place then cry when it's gone? How is this new?

Isn't this akin to dumping all you money into one stock then whining when it tanks?

The critical flaw

[Nephroth]

The critical flaw of cloud computing is that you entrust your data to a third party. If you are at all concerned with privacy you will think cloud computing is a terrible idea.

Re:What Do You Do When the Cloud Shuts Down?

[CastrTroy]

Insurance means nothing. Once your data is lost, it is lost. Whether or not you get money out of them in compensation for the lost data is almost non-important. I would say that anything you lost would be completely non-producable, even if you had all the money in the world. A picture of your family on vacation, can't be reproduced. You can go on another vacation, but it won't be the same vacation. Any document you have typed out, could be typed out again, but it would be different each time. Unless you are talking about lost music files, in which case, you could download them again, but that's kind of the same as having a backup. Any data that's really important isn't going to reproducible.

Re:Not a new problem!

[jgtg32a]

Kinda funny when you think about it, the backups are stored locally and the working copies are stored far away.