The ‘office’ was only devised so that people could gather round ‘technology’ such as typewriters and roneo copiers. How many times have you suffered a nightmare commute only to spend the day on the phone which you could have done equally well at home? Then came PCs, again sited in the office until the laptop and the mobile phone came along which gave rise to the home and mobile worker.
We moved from location dependence to device dependence, containing all the data we required to perform our duties, further enhanced by the penetration of broadband internet and wireless hubs. But still we copy and store an increasing volume of data on laptops, CDs and memory sticks because it’s so easy - so easy to lose 25 million families child benefit details on two CDs in the post, so easy to lose a memory stick with unencrypted personal details of 10,000 prolific offenders, and release dates of all 84,000 prisoners in England and Wales, and 33,000 records from the Police National Computer. This is like carrying 33 filing cabinets around with you.
Not new
Businesses are now moving to The Cloud as they realise that, given appropriate security and accountability, access to software (SaaS) and data provides significant benefits including cost, compliance and consistency. This is not new as, back in the 70’s when I was MD of a division of Time-Life, all our accounts were hosted by Geisco who provided a timeshare service. When I logged in one day I connected to a mainframe in Atlanta, the next day Sydney. The difference today is low cost storage and high speed broadband.
Business moving to The Cloud is inevitable. A board can no longer defend the costs and risks of operating an in-house IT department any more than they could defend a typing pool, a telephone switchboard or a power turbine. The problem is security, and data encryption is only a part of the solution albeit that it should be automatically applied to all data, business, government and personal. A key component will be the architecture of the platforms used to provide these services and, more importantly, protect sensitive information stored.
When we started Infobank in the early 90’s the aim was to provide businesses with upstream management of their purchasing resulting in reduced costs of procurement. At the time I called this SRM (Supplier Relationship Management) to position it alongside their downstream CRM. e-Procurement became a sector with, alongside Infobank, companies such as Ariba and CommerceOne providing employees controlled access to the company’s directory of preferred suppliers and products to facilitate bulk buying and just-in-time delivery. And it delivered until we all got caught up in the dotcom crash.
All well and good for business but what about us as individuals interacting with them? As a consumer, a citizen, an employee, a patient, we increasingly care about our privacy as we witness the cavalier attitude organisations, public and private, have shown towards our personal information. That even the fundamental precaution of data encryption is rarely applied and personal information is sold and shared, without our knowledge let alone permission, with other organisations that we would not choose to share it with. In fact we, as individuals are only now beginning to realise that our personal information has significant value in the right hands and, notwithstanding a derisory £0.001 credit on a loyalty card for every £100 spent, we are seeing little or no benefit from it apart from a deluge of spam.
I want access to my personal cloud on any device at any time to store, update and manage my personal information (Identity, Financial, Health, Education & Career, Property, Social, etc.).
My Cloud
I want to be able to ‘write once’ and share relevant information with my preferred suppliers (and synchronise with their CRM silo) on my terms (e.g. not for resale) and to turn it off when I choose. In return I will keep the information up to date and, if appropriate, use 3rd party services to authenticate me and to certify assertions I might make. I may also ‘publish’ my interests and intentions, my RFP, anonymously but I reserve the right to charge for this information (Permission Based Marketing) which marketers can choose to accept or reject. The Intention Economy (customer pull) is so much more valuable than the Attention Economy (marketing push).
I want a record of what information I shared with whom, when and why. This is my Cloud, my personal information ‘under my control, with my consent, and for my benefit’. IIt provides a channel for 2-way conversations, transactions and relationships between willing buyers (C2B & B2B) and willing sellers (B2C & B2B) in a dynamic digital market. It is the underlying principle of VRM (Vendor Relationship Management). And it is the future.