Living in “The Cloud”

Recently I’ve been giving a lot of thought to the pros and cons of living in the cloud, so to speak. If you’re not familiar with this term, living in the cloud basically means that you keep most of your important documents, email, etc. with online access so you can access it from any computer and you’re not tied to one desktop.

I’ve moved my email into the cloud for the most part instead of using MS Outlook so heavily at home, and I’m digging it so far. Gmail makes it really easy to do, although, I can’t do it 100% because you’re only allowed 5 additional email accounts coming through Gmail. I’ve begun updating a to-do document in Google Documents, but that’s about my only moves into the cloud so far.

So, to outline it for anyone considering making this move, here’s what I’ve discerned:

Pros:

1. Access from anywhere, any computer.
2. Centralized services through Google.
3. If something happens to one of your computers you don’t have to worry about data stored in the cloud.
4. Easier to share documents or data with other people via the internet.

Cons:

1. You don’t have control over the technology the data is stored on, so if their servers go down you’re toast.
2. There’s always the potential threat (albeit very low) of hacking.
3. Some firewalls may prevent access to this data depending on the connection you’re attempting to access it from (slim chance, but there).
4. Business and pleasure are intertwined to an extent.