IBM?s open cloud causes controversy

IBM’s Cloud Computing Interoperability Forum, a plan to initiate an industry wide data cloud, has been beset by accusations of ‘closed dealing.’

According to the BBC, Google pulled out of the strategy, while Amazon and Microsoft refused to sign.

Microsoft has criticised the implementation of the scheme, saying that it was asked to sign a “secret manifesto” at short notice.

“Very recently we were privately shown a copy of the document, warned that it was a secret, and told that it must be signed ‘as is,’ without modifications or additional input,” commented Microsoft’s senior director of developer platform product management Steve Martin, in his blog.

“It appears to us that one company, or just a few companies, would prefer to control the evolution of cloud computing, as opposed to reaching a consensus across key stakeholders (including cloud users) through an ‘open’ process. An open Manifesto emerging from a closed process is, at best, mildly ironic.”