Cloud Computing Solution: Amazon Kindle

Source: Amazon Cloud Reader

Kindle Cloud Reader is an application for Amazon subscribers to access to their ebook online. Every user is provided with an account. All of their purchase is being stored in a cloud environment provided by Amazon. Once they login, they can access to their ebooks stored in the cloud. If they want to read it offline, they can download the book into their devices on hand for further reading. The device could be Kindle, ipad, or other device with the said application installed. With the cloud environment people do not have to worry about losing their ebook due to hardware failure or some other reasons. The Amazon cloud provides a high availability solution for users. Also the reading would not be limited on a single device.

However, unlike other cloud solutions available for education context. A key element is not in their blueprint of Kindle Cloud Reader, i.e. sharing. The cloud reader is designed to allow only a single account to access to a single book. It is most likely a business concern instead of a technology constraint. Allow sharing of a book means the sales would drop dramatically. In fact intellectual property is one of the major concern of publishers move for digital. They are afraid their sales would drop and at the same time, serious the privacy issue. In fact there are some other problems behind the scene, authors would lose their royalty, again reduce their revenue. It is a chain which affect a lot of people. As a result, it is expect that there would be a lot of tools developed with sharing functions. However, when it comes to anything related to sales or intellectual property, we don’t see any possibility of the said functions to be developed in the near future.

On the other hand, another major concern of cloud computing would be its data security. It is no doubt that cloud service providers would spend a fortune in IT development to ensure the data is safe. However, organizations are worry about whether they information, clientbase, financial information would be leaked for whatever reason. For example, would it be leaked due to political reason, i.e. would you expect Chinese government to put anything confidential into an American based company? Definitely not! Still it doesn’t mean Cloud computing would not success. It is only a matter of what to put in, and for what purpose. For reading purpose like Amazon Cloud Reader, it wouldn’t be a problem at all. The same apply to Google Drive and Docs which web 2.0 elements are even stronger. It is expected that people won’t put something confidential onto Google Docs neither. But as a students like us to put our work there, it is an excellent tool.