The list just keeps growing of cloud subscription services shutting down. Remember Argus optical implants too? If they don't shut down, they hold you to ransom with any annual fee increase they want to charge, or like Microsoft did with SQL server, they just change the way they calculate the costs. We've seen Chumbies, and many similar devices, just become door stoppers and paper weights.
Call me old-fashioned, but I love to self-host what I use, and if it can't get upgrades, it can at least just keep running. With the data on-site, I can migrate it to another service in my own good time.
Yes, it's cheaper for a small non-tech company to just buy a service online, but they really do need to think seriously about the risks (or pay someone to think for them). Always assume a cloud service will end at some point in time, and get an answer in writing as to what your exit strategy is. Being able to download your data does not imply you can just 'use it' as-is in another service. Is it even saved in an open data format?
I just worry about more and more governments buying an on-site Oracle cloud service (or whichever) and wonder how they will ever exit those services... Or will it be like Microsoft Office, where companies just feel they can't change ever? And of course, with these transitions, these organisations no longer 'need' their own clued-up IT staff. So who has their real interests at heart, without the inclusion of a legal disclaimer? Who inside the organisation really knows how to judge what the external provider's salesperson is punting?
Yes it's the time of cloud services, but I'm really interested to see how this plays out over time because I know too it is highly unlikely we'll be going back to strong internal IT shops. Accounting triumphs over data sovereignty and data continuity.
See
The ‘Military Metaverse’ Calls It Quits#
technology #
cloudservices #
vendorlockin #
military #
metaverse 
The company called 'Improbable’ wanted to create a realistic training environment for military forces, but it never got its tech off the ground.
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