Comments on: The Sidekick Failure and Cloud Culpability

By: Microsoft=Fail

Microsoft=Fail — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 23:24:25 +0000

Sigh, Microsoft fails yet AGAIN!!! I only feel sorry for T-Mobile for having to suffer due to such an incompetent company, but then again why would they trust Microsoft with their cloud computing needs!?

By: Storm Cloud

Storm Cloud — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 21:22:31 +0000

well, this just goes to show you that the fat cats, c-levels and such, in the tech industry should stop running around talking about the greatness of the cloud! the media blitz has consumed the technical reality that only a very small % of what is online is actually utilizing the future ‘cloud computing’ architecture. Cloud has now replace ‘Internet’ as the word of the day. Get ready techies and geeks, everything in ‘cyberspace’ is now ‘the cloud’.

Uh, and the answer is YES the outage will impact the future of cloud acceptance, as the average dude walking down the street could not tell what is ‘cloud’, ‘internet’, ‘cyberspace’ and has been sold the magic ‘cloud’ vision from our own tech industry talking heads….

By: Bill Ruby

Bill Ruby — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 20:56:02 +0000

If you loose data or cant access data because of your provider its a FAIL. Maybe not a cloud FAIL but a FAIL just the same. Everone needs to remeber that your data s king AND YOUR RESPONSIBILITY! Completley trusting any outside vendor with your data is risky.

By: Angry Customer

Angry Customer — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 18:45:45 +0000

Forum.sidekickfail.com has recently been created as an open and neutral place sidekick customers can exchange ideas and vent without the fear of their valuable thoughts, ideas, and opinions being deleted and disrespected as T-Mobile has been doing on their forums.

By: The Planet - Kevin

The Planet - Kevin — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:53:16 +0000

From what I’ve read, it’s not a cloud failure, but it is a failure in the cloud.

I’ve read a few of Sam Johnson’s posts, and I understand his recommendation for cloud to be geographically dispersed and redundant, but just because a particular instance doesn’t meet those criteria doesn’t mean it is not a “cloud.” Maybe there’s some kind of “Cloud” v. “cloud” debate going on where the “big-C” Cloud is the Utopian version he references and the “little-c” cloud covers any kind of platform that exists independently above specific pieces of hardware.

The problem (as I understand it) is an administration issue. It doesn’t matter what you call where the data was stored … it seems like it was poor change control management. Did I miss something? Is the fact that the data was in a “cloud” relevant to the fact that it appears this was a botched upgrade?

By: Mark MacAuley

Mark MacAuley — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 14:55:49 +0000

It’s a failure in the design of process which is ultimately supported by technology. Backups apparently weren’t part of the process, so no technology will support something it is not aware of or told to do. As for failure of the cloud? I don’t see it that way. The same thing would happen in many environments – no backups=no restore point. No restore point=do over.

By: Stuart

Stuart — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 02:55:03 +0000

I agree that this is not the way to do cloud but the whole point is that you can’t argue it is not cloud at all.

Bigger story is that I posted a post on the T-Mobile forums about starting a “Revolt” by stating on the forum when we will cancel service and how much money T-Mobile will lose a month from us.

Apparently that is enough to get banned from the site. Our IP address is blocked. The problem is that the forum is the only place you can go right now to get updated information on what is going on.

Obviously both T-Mobile and Microsoft are more concerned about the perception of their “cloud” services than the services themselves…

By: Scott

Scott — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 20:38:26 +0000

The Sidekick system stores and retrieves the handheld’s contact information, notes, bookmarks and pictures to/from the backend system.
This data is (normally) available through a web portal hosted at T-Mobile.com, giving Sidekick users an additional way to access their content. The system also uses a backend web browsing application to process/compact and send the resulting streamlined web content back out to the devices.

To me this sounds like a cloud technology, and recent events a reminder that cloud technologies can fail spectacularly just like anything else if improperly managed.

By: Roelf

Roelf — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 20:34:13 +0000

@natan,

no sidekick but passionate, passionate anti cloud. Cloud is just another stupid hype to rob people of there hard earned money. As everybody with a practical view on the cloud and it’s possibilities I too advocate ‘Give your date to someone else? Might as well trow it in the vertical archive.” Cloud is slow, impractical, and will never become much more then a place where app builders can roam your money for a service that you already have at home. They just want to control your data en look what they do with it. Further more nobody seems to realize that without global connectivity it’s pretty useless. Put it in fridge and don’t open for the next 10 year.

By: Mobile AL Cabling - Low Voltage Voice and Data Wiring

Mobile AL Cabling - Low Voltage Voice and Data Wiring — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 18:37:12 +0000

Hope they have a back up, I wonder what kind of danger I will be in with my G1.