a great book for the fundamentals of Amazon Web Services...

I read Jeff Barr's book on Amazon Web Services (Kindle edition) - using a Droid phone and a Kindle device. My take thus far: this is a great resource for getting a grip on the fundamentals of Amazon Web Services. I worked extensively with some AWS services (S3, SimpleDB, and EC2) and applications like SDB Explorer and Bolso prior to reading the book, but I can still say that I've learned quite a bit from this book.

The code for the programming examples is in PHP. Making the examples work on your system requires creativity at some points. The author states his technical expectations early in the book and it's expected that the reader has a base proficiency with PHP, along with some system administrator skills. I found it fastest to download and use the CloudFusion code on GitHub; I'm running the examples on a Fedora 8 EC2 instance.

Barr uses the "programmable data center" concept to explain cloud computing, and when you get to chapter 5 and run the EC2 API example in PHP, it's an empowering feeling. At that point, theory and practice come together. This script ran successfully (launching an EC2 instance, claming and mapping an IP, then creating and attaching EBS volumes programatically) the first time I ran it. Likewise, the modular application (using SQS) that scrapes web site images and creates composite pages gave me a sense of AWS' potential.

I have to say that I hit a wall just beyond the halfway point in this book, when it came to getting the AWS CloudWatch code functioning. At this point, to move forward with this section (CloudWatch, EBL...), I feel that I'll have to learn more about the CloudWatch API. In this case, I feel that the book and code sample explanations for working with the CloudWatch API are insufficient. (I got the command line tools for CloudWatch running, but not the PHP code example, particularly listing measures. Couldn't fix it by googling or reading on the AWS PHP SDK documentation.) In short, I had to skip most of the chapter and just go on.

There are chapters covering SimpleDB and the RDS (Relational Database Service). For SimpleDB: I found myself using the book examples as a launching point for building my own small SimpleDB applications. You can take Barr's code examples and the SimpleDB API documentation at URL http://docs.amazonwebservices.com/AmazonSimpleDB/2007-11-07/DeveloperGuide/ (API Reference/Operations) to programatically work with SimpleDB as needed for your project. That is, you can use the object-oriented code examples and the Request and Response information to create the needed applications - which illustrates the programmable data center concept better than anything.

Overall, highly recommended. I found some challenges in working with the Kindle edition, in terms of viewing illustrations. I found it possible to run most, but not all, of the code examples in the book. And I'm much more proficient with and knowledgeable about AWS than when I started readng it.

The Mesh

Reading Lisa Gansky's The Mesh. A friend highly recommended it to me after he read it.

Gansky's focus is the "streamlining of access to physical goods and services," in large part through web and mobile technologies (18). It's unfortunate that, living in the Pullman-Moscow, ID area, my access to these kinds of services will be limited. The author describes Zipcar as "a Full Mesh model" service, but looking at the cities and universities that have Zipcar services, you can see that the model succeeds in urban centers. Or, another way to look at it: the Mesh makes living in urban centers more affordable, and in smaller communities relatively less so.

Gansky notes that some companies are applying the lessons learned in open source software development to physical goods (60). This is a more compelling notion for me today than it would have been four or five years ago. The development of social networking technologies does fundamentally change a company's ability to take user feedback into account in product and service design. Thus, it's a meshing of the open source ethic and current information technologies that enable rapid service improvements and the creation of shared product services.

In terms of moving from owning to renting or leasing services: I can say that for computer support, I've made this move recently through the purchase of an Amazon Web Services [cloud] EC2 reserved instance. In a sense, I'm leasing my personal software development space. I still need a device that enables me to connect to this instance (via SSH for the Linux command line; via a web browser to review online sites), but it's a new - and more fulfilling - model for me.

It seems like if you follow Gansky's argument, that we're moving from an ownership to a sharing model, you have to accept the idea that the private sector will provide most of the services - because the public sector is shrinking as we speak. For example, when she notes the fact that more young Americans are opting not to obtain a drivers license when they reach age 17, she cites several public and private transportation options, including mass transit. But who's going to fund mass transit in 2010? Washington state is relatively progressive, but in the 2010 midterms, voters statewide opted to repeal an existing sales tax on candy and bottled water that was put in place to close the state's revenue gap. Candy and bottled water! The author's vision is noble, but the public's will is weak.


Somehow, I missed the St. Croix Falls Cinema story that the author describes in chapter 5 (see this article for info), but it is interesting that the chain (Evergreen Entertainment) now accepts credit and debit cards for tickets. Gansky's summary illustrates the power of social media, but reading the article at the above link (including the first two letters) provides a more informative account of what happened than the author provides in the book.

Crowdsourcing - the book

I read Jeff Howe's Crowdsourcing. To me, this book has much the same texture as Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat. I feel that I benefited from reading both books, which include numerous anecdotal examples on how technology and new business models have empowered individuals in unimaginable ways. At the same time, I feel like both Friedman and Howe understate the societal damage. I don't want to shoot the messenger in either case (as Friedman was targeted), but that's my perception. An example: Howe reports the impact of services like iStockPhoto on the stock photo industry and the fact that Bruce Livingstone, iStockPhoto's founder, made $25 million off the sale of the company to Getty Images, while the earnings of stock photographers plunged. Howe doesn't note the irony when quoting an iStock executive who asserts that "the community is the company" (188). True, it's just change, but it also seems like an architecture for ever-increasing economic inequality.

The value in Jeff Howe's book is that he makes the reader think about how to successfully build services in this radically new environment. Continuing with the iStockPhoto example, the author describes the role of iStockalypses (iStockPhoto-sponsored meetings) and self-starting user meetings in fostering a sense of community and meaning among active iStockers. In short, the corporate strategy in using crowdsourcing has to be well thought out and one that respects the larger community's willingness to contribute its "excess capacity" (its time and skills) (196).

One unsympathetic victim of technological change is the recording industry Led by RIAA president Cary Sherman and attorneys like Matt Oppenheim, the RIAA essentially declared war on its own customers in recent years through a string of high-profile lawsuits. For that reason, Howe's coverage of the band Hawthorne Heights in the book is refreshing. At an intuitive level, the more open or sharing approach of reduced music sales, with the trade-off revenues from concert ticket sales and other products is just a better model for the 21st century. Certainly a better model than predatory lawsuits against your own customers....

Howe explores the subtleties of crowdsourcing, including the distinction between crowdsourcing and crowdcasting ("someone with a problem broadcasts it to a large, undefined network of potential solvers" [134]), a distinction that I didn't fully understand before reading this book.

Overall, a worthwhile read, though increasingly dated. The 2009 edition that I read includes a status update from the author.