Daily Meh is an edited stream of consciousness, by Simen.

Cloud computing is a trap, warns GNU founder

Larry Ellison:

The interesting thing about cloud computing is that we’ve redefined cloud computing to include everything that we already do,” he said. “The computer industry is the only industry that is more fashion-driven than women’s fashion. Maybe I’m an idiot, but I have no idea what anyone is talking about. What is it? It’s complete gibberish. It’s insane.

Richard Stallman:

Richard Stallman (…) said that cloud computing was simply a trap aimed at forcing more people to buy into locked, proprietary systems that would cost them more and more over time.

“It’s stupidity. It’s worse than stupidity: it’s a marketing hype campaign,” he told The Guardian. “Somebody is saying this is inevitable – and whenever you hear somebody saying that, it’s very likely to be a set of businesses campaigning to make it true.”

But is gmail The Guardian’s or Stallman’s example? I agree with him that outsourcing your computer is not the way to go if you don’t want to be even more at mercy of corporate interests — but seriously, Gmail? It makes no business sense for Google to lock it up and have you pay for the privilege.