Stories by Brandon Butler

Take me out to the ballgame, with 4G

Ever been to a sports game and tried to send a text message, upload a photo to Facebook, or send a tweet about that awesome play that just happened? If so, you may have been left frustrated by the overcrowded network that prevented that all-important message from making your friends jealous.

Gartner: Don't trust cloud provider to protect your corporate assets

When a family with a baby buys a new car, they don't buy a car seat from the vehicle manufacturer: There is specialized equipment to handle the family's most sensitive asset. John Pescatore, a Gartner vice president and security analyst, says cloud security can be thought of in a similar way: Users shouldn't rely on their cloud service provider's security features to protect their most critical data.

Customisable Cloud SLAs on the way, researchers predict

Service-level agreements and legal standards for Cloud offerings will become more customised to individual customers and vertical industries as the cloud market continues to mature and providers look for ways to differentiate their offerings, researchers at the University of London predict.

Avaya lays out roadmap for unified software management

As Avaya continues its transition from a hardware company into a communications and collaboration software provider, it is going through some growing pains, including a shakeup of executives and uncertainty around a potential initial public offering that's been rumored for months.

Up next for the Cloud: Big data analytics?

In an effort to diversify its Cloud offerings, NaviSite - a Time Warner Cable Cloud computing and managed hosting company - announced plans to offer storage service for customers in what one analyst says could the beginning of service providers looking to offer big data analysis from the Cloud.

VMware: Virtualise the rest of the datacentre

The server has been virtualised, now it's time for the rest of the datacentre - including the network - to catch up. That's the message form VMware at this year's Interop, as the company seeks to ensure it remains a major enterprise IT player while the software-defined networking trend continues to gain momentum.

Cloud providers touting multi-hypervisor support

When Tata Communications, the Indian telecommunications company, rolls out its infrastructure as a service cloud offering in America in the coming months, company officials want to claim differentiating features in the products. And one they're hoping to include is support for multiple hypervisors.

Infrastructure cloud services take a shift toward PaaS

LAS VEGAS -- Services providers that have traditionally offered infrastructure as a service (IaaS) clouds are beginning to move up the stack into the platform as a service (PaaS) market in an effort to diversify their portfolio and respond to increasing customer demand for cloud-based development services.

Gartner says half of enterprises are wasting money on social media

Getting a positive return on investment from a social media campaign is about more than tracking the number of your Facebook fans and Twitter followers. It's about linking the social strategy to measurable business objectives, according to Gartner, which says most businesses aren't doing this.

Interop puts software-defined networking in limelight

The potential game-changing technology that surrounds software-defined networking (SDN) will be center stage at Interop next week with high-profile product introductions, technology demos and information sessions all set to roll.

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