Cloud Computing Benefits
Cloud computing- a ‘trendy’ term that to many, may still sound a bit vague, but once it’s value is understood in its entirety, it is really not so ambiguous. A recent article from EurActiv, simply defines cloud computing as a term based on the principle that users do not usually own the physical infrastructure which hosts applications and software. Keeping that in mind, cloud computing comes into focus when thinking about what IT always needs: a way to augment capacity or add capabilities on demand without investing in new infrastructure, personnel, or software. Cloud computing includes any subscription-based or pay-per-use service that can expand IT’s existing capabilities in real time, over the Internet. Viviane Reding, EU Information Society Commissioner advised SMBs that cloud computing services are the cure needed for the current economic downturn. She strongly believes that cloud computing services can increase business productivity by changing from fixed costs (i.e. hiring staff or buying PCs) to variable costs (i.e. you only pay for what you use). During her speech, Reding highlighted some very valuable points. In Europe, there are 23 million SMBs, making up to 99% of all of their firms. However, SMBs continue to fall behind in the use of ICT tools that can enhance overall productivity. It was estimated that a million new jobs could be created simply by relocating office activities to the cloud. This can potentially add up to 0.2% to Europe’s annual GDP within the next five years. With cloud computing uncertainty to the side, SMBs worldwide are clearly encouraged to leverage web-based services to begin to overcome the global recession. So what are you waiting for? Enjoy immediate cost savings and the complete benefits that cloud computing can bring to your business through Pingsta ICE™.
The Glue
People who have kept the internet up and running have always had different names for themselves; internetwork engineers, web pros, router jocks, the list goes on and on. But recently, a new term has been coined to describe the hardworking people behind the scenes who keep our essential Internet infrastructure up and running: The Glue. When you think about it, this term makes the most sense, and truly describes what we do in the shadows.
Today, the world expects everything to be on the Internet –not only their music and movies but also essentials like medical records, bank accounts and vital personal data. People want to access all their data at any time, through any media from anywhere. As the Glue, network engineers are responsible for keeping people unfamiliar with technology meshed with the complicated system on which they depend. So good job Pingsta Members, you are the essential, and more importantly, top of the line Glue of the world.
-Will
The Pingsta Fun Fact
Many members may have breezed right over the login screen while accessing their Pingsta account, totally missing the Pingsta ICE™ fun fact of the week. This week’s fun fact describes one particular member, who has earned over fifteen thousand dollars in the last few weeks by using Pingsta ICE™. This engineer has made enough to surpass the monthly income of an engineer at any major telecommunications company, just by leisurely sitting at their computer, wherever they wanted, at their own convenience.
This simple fact solidifies the message and technology that Pingsta ICE™ brings to the world. The future is here, and Pingsta members can now truly work from anywhere on the planet, and more importantly on their own time, to monetize their knowledge. The opportunity is now, and the possibilities for personal gain are limitless.
-Will
Pingsta ICE is Out of Beta
Pingsta ICE is finally out of Beta status, fully ready for the enterprise! The entire Pingsta team have been working ferociously over the past few months, dotting the Is and crossing the Ts and finally, the wait is over. The time to truly empower the world is here.
Pingsta members can now expect a full array of break-fix, consulting and R&D tasks from some of the largest and most prestigious service providers and enterprises across the globe.
So Pingsta members: you worked hard to become industry-experts, get out there and start monetizing your knowledge by Pingsta ICE-ing from anywhere in the world through any media.
-Will
pingBox 0.1 is launched
FYI… Pingsta recently launched pingBox 0.1 to facilitate intra-Pingsta communication.
What is the “Ping Me” feature?
The Ping Me feature is an intra-pingsta communication tool that allows you to “Ping” other Pingsta members and send them short messages.
How does it work?
Click on the Ping Me button from the people page, enter your message in the displayed form and send. Your message will be sent to the user’s Pingsta pingBox and a copy will also be forwarded to their regular email inbox.
How do I track my Pings?
All your sent and received pings are stored in your pingBox.
For more information on pingBox and other Pingsta features, go to http://pingsta.com/help.
Happy pinging!
Deka
Pingsta Mailserver Malicious Attack – Update
Our investigation has revealed that the cause of yesterday’s mailblast incident was a malicious attack on our mailserver sourced (or spoofed) from 202.71.201.178 which resolves to en201178.uac63.hknet.com. Our engineers are currently taking all necessary steps to ensure that this never happens again.
Once again, we apologize profusely to all those that were impacted by this incident and we are most grateful for the relentless support we’ve received from our members and ecosystem.
We’ve learnt a few lessons from this incident that will no doubt make us stronger and improve the Pingsta experience for all.
Sincerely,
Peter and the Pingsta team.
PS. What a way to start the new year! 
Pingsta mailserver bug
All,
Within the last hour, we have been experiencing a bug in our mail-servers that is causing multiple copies of unwarranted Pingsta invitations to be sent out. We ask that you please bear with us as we investigate the root cause of this issue.
Apologies for any inconvenience this may cause you.
Happy new year
Peter 
mySolvr is live!
In case you’re wondering why we’ve been so quiet over the past couple of months, it’s because we’ve been working tirelessly to launch mySolvr – Pingsta’s open repository of internetwork intelligence.
As you may know, the lack of an openly available repository of internetwork intelligence that is comprehensive, organized and validated is the key driver for this core Pingsta objective.
Thus, we invite network engineers and enthusiasts alike from all corners of the world to sign up to mySolvr – it’s free and open to all – and start submitting entries today so that the world can benefit from our collective intellectual capital.
See mySolvr FAQ for more information.
Enjoy,
Peter
Weekly Weigh-In #6 – The "Self-Healing" Internet
Any business that relies heavily on web apps and services needs to have a safety net. This was made abundantly clear this week when we saw cisco.com of all sites offline for a little under three hours during U.S. business hours.
Cisco’s PR team posted the following message:
“We have traced the cause of the issue to an accident during maintenance of a San Jose data center that resulted in a power outage in that facility.”
Now, irrespective of the amount of money that they, their partners and their clients lost while the site was down (which after doing a little research could potentially be quite a lot) this begs the question: what happened to redundancy, traffic engineering, distributed networking, the self-healing network, etc?
Cisco as the giant networking company must surely have failovers in place to prevent this kind of scenario and they of all people should know that a well designed network infrastructure will not have the failover backup data center in the same locale, state or even country.
Regardless of the reason(s)-for-outage, we have to seriously start considering how to make the Internet openly self-healing. My rudimentary thoughts on this include a possible scenario where web servers from across the world serve as “peer-to-peer cache-servers” for other websites, such that when a user requests a page from pingsta.com for example and that particular page is temporarily unavailable for whatever reason, any other non-pingsta web server closest to the user geographically can present the most recently cached copy of that page seamlesly.
Thoughts?
Owen
