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Food and Flavor: A Gastronomic Guide to Health and Good Living: Chapter III - Our Denatured Foods

I have lingered thus long on the extreme bank

Christian Science by Mark Twain, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book . CHAPTER III here CHAPTER III Under the powerful influence of the near treatment and the absent treatment together, my bones were gradually retreating inward and disappearing from view. The good work took a brisk start, now, and went on swiftly. My body was diligently straining and stretching, this way and that, to accommodate the processes of restoration, and every minute or two I heard a dull click inside and knew that the two ends of a fracture had been successfully joined. This muffled clicking and gritting and grinding and rasping continued during the next three hours, and then stopped—the connections had all been made. All except dislocations; there were only seven of these: hips, shoulders, knees, neck; so that was soon over; one after another they slipped into their sockets with a sound like pulling a distant cork, and I jumped up as good as new, as to framework, and sent for the horse-doctor. I was obliged to do this because I had a stomach-ache and a cold in the head, and I was not willing to trust these things any longer in the hands of a woman whom I did not know, and whose ability to successfully treat mere disease I had lost all confidence. My position was justified by the fact that the cold and the ache had been in her charge from the first, along with the fractures, but had experienced not a shade of relief; and, indeed, the ache was even growing worse and worse, and more and more bitter, now, probably on account of the protracted abstention from food and drink. The horse-doctor came, a pleasant man and full of hope and professional interest in the case. In the matter of smell he was pretty aromatic—in fact, quite horsy—and I tried to arrange with him for absent treatment, but it was not in his line, so, out of delicacy, I did not press it. He looked at my teeth and examined my hock, and said my age and general condition were favorable to energetic measures; therefore he would give me something to turn the stomach-ache into the botts and the cold in the head into the blind staggers; then he should be on his own beat and would know what to do. He made up a bucket of bran-mash, and said a dipperful of it every two hours, alternated with a drench with turpentine and axle-grease in it, would either knock my ailments out of me in twenty-four hours, or so interest me in other ways as to make me forget they were on the premises. He administered my first dose himself, then took his leave, saying I was free to eat and drink anything I pleased and in any quantity I liked. But I was not hungry any more, and did not care for food. I took up the Christian Science book and read half of it, then took a dipperful of drench and read the other half. The resulting experiences were full of interest and adventure. All through the rumblings and grindings and quakings and effervescings accompanying the evolution of the ache into the botts and the cold into the blind staggers I could note the generous struggle for mastery going on between the mash and the drench and the literature; and often I could tell which was ahead, and could easily distinguish the literature from the others when the others were separate, though not when they were mixed; for when a bran-mash and an eclectic drench are mixed together they look just like the Apodictical Principle out on a lark, and no one can tell it from that. The finish was reached at last, the evolutions were complete, and a fine success, but I think that this result could have been achieved with fewer materials. I believe the mash was necessary to the conversion of the stomach-ache into the botts, but I think one could develop the blind staggers out of the literature by itself; also, that blind staggers produced in this way would be of a better quality and more lasting than any produced by the artificial processes of the horse-doctor. For of all the strange and frantic and incomprehensible and uninterpretable books which the imagination of man has created, surely this one is the prize sample. It is written with a limitless confidence and complacency, and with a dash and stir and earnestness which often compel the effects of eloquence, even when the words do not seem to have any traceable meaning. There are plenty of people who imagine they understand the book; I know this, for I have talked with them; but in all cases they were people who also imagined that there were no such things as pain, sickness, and death, and no realities in the world; nothing actually existent but Mind. It seems to me to modify the value of their testimony. When these people talk about Christian Science they do as Mrs. Fuller did: they do not use their own language, but the book's; they pour out the book's showy incoherences, and leave you to find out later that they were not originating, but merely quoting; they seem to know the volume by heart, and to revere it as they would a Bible—another Bible, perhaps I ought to say. Plainly the book was written under the mental desolations of the Third Degree, and I feel sure that none but the membership of that Degree can discover meanings in it. When you read it you seem to be listening to a lively and aggressive and oracular speech delivered in an unknown tongue, a speech whose spirit you get but not the particulars; or, to change the figure, you seem to be listening to a vigorous instrument which is making a noise which it thinks is a tune, but which, to persons not members of the band, is only the martial tooting of a trombone, and merrily stirs the soul through the noise, but does not convey a meaning. The book's serenities of self-satisfaction do almost seem to smack of a heavenly origin—they have no blood-kin in the earth. It is more than human to be so placidly certain about things, and so finely superior, and so airily content with one's performance. Without ever presenting anything which may rightfully be called by the strong name of Evidence, and sometimes without even mentioning a reason for a deduction at all, it thunders out the startling words, “I have Proved” so and so. It takes the Pope and all the great guns of his Church in battery assembled to authoritatively settle and establish the meaning of a sole and single unclarified passage of Scripture, and this at vast cost of time and study and reflection, but the author of this work is superior to all that: she finds the whole Bible in an unclarified audition, and at small expense of time and no expense of mental effort she clarifies it from lid to lid, reorganizes and improves the meanings, then authoritatively settles and establishes them with formulas which you cannot tell from “Let there be light!” and “Here you have it!” It is the first time since the dawn-days of Creation that a Voice has gone crashing through space with such placid and complacent confidence and command. [January, 1903. The first reading of any book whose terminology is new and strange is nearly sure to leave the reader in a bewildered and sarcastic state of mind. But now that, during the past two months, I have, by diligence gained a fair acquaintanceship with Science and Health technicalities, I no longer find the bulk of that work hard to understand.—M. T.] P.S. The wisdom harvested from the foregoing thoughts has already done me a service and saved me a sorrow. Nearly a month ago there came to me from one of the universities a tract by Dr. Edward Anthony Spitzka on the “Encephalic Anatomy of the Races.” I judged that my opinion was desired by the university, and I was greatly pleased with this attention and wrote and said I would furnish it as soon as I could. That night I put my plodding and disheartening Christian Science mining aside and took hold of the matter. I wrote an eager chapter, and was expecting to finish my opinion the next day, but was called away for a week, and my mind was soon charged with other interests. It was not until to-day, after the lapse of nearly a month, that I happened upon my Encephalic chapter again. Meantime, the new wisdom had come to me, and I read it with shame. I recognized that I had entered upon that work in far from the right temper—far from the respectful and judicial spirit which was its due of reverence. I had begun upon it with the following paragraph for fuel: “FISSURES OF THE PARIETAL AND OCCIPITAL LOBES (LATERAL SURFACE).—The Postcentral Fissural Complex—In this hemicerebrum, the postcentral and subcentral are combined to form a continuous fissure, attaining a length of 8.5 cm. Dorsally, the fissure bifurcates, embracing the gyre indented by the caudal limb of the paracentral. The caudal limb of the postcentral is joined by a transparietal piece. In all, five additional rami spring from the combined fissure. A vadum separates it from the parietal; another from the central.” It humiliates me, now, to see how angry I got over that; and how scornful. I said that the style was disgraceful; that it was labored and tumultuous, and in places violent, that the treatment was involved and erratic, and almost, as a rule, bewildering; that to lack of simplicity was added a lack of vocabulary; that there was quite too much feeling shown; that if I had a dog that would get so excited and incoherent over a tranquil subject like Encephalic Anatomy I would not pay his tax; and at that point I got excited myself and spoke bitterly of these mongrel insanities, and said a person might as well try to understand Science and Health. [I know, now, where the trouble was, and am glad of the interruption that saved me from sending my verdict to the university. It makes me cold to think what those people might have thought of me.—M. T.] About HackerNoon Book Series: We bring you the most important technical, scientific, and insightful public domain books. This book is part of the public domain. Mark Twain (2004). Christian Science. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved October 2022 https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/3187/pg3187-images.html This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at , located at . www.gutenberg.org https://www.gutenberg.org/policy/license.html

Under the powerful influence of the near treatment and the absent treatment

THE SACRED BEETLE: THE BALL

While reading about search engine optimization (SEO), you may have heard marketers talk about local SEO. There’s a good reason this is such a popular topic; of all Google searches are for local products, services, and businesses. 45% The rise of smartphones and other mobile devices has made tracking down local companies easier than ever before. Instead of pulling out a phonebook, consumers can type or speak into their device and find crucial details about businesses, such as their location, reviews, and product availability. Brands that don’t optimize their stores for these factors generally see fewer in-store customers and far less traction online. Local SEO will continue to impact brand visibility and engagement across all industries. If your goal is to reach more prospects and customers that live or work close to your physical storefront, you’re in the right place. Today, I’ll show you several ways to enhance your local SEO strategy. You can use these tips to improve your visibility on Google, which can lead to a significant and engagement. boost in sales Let’s get started. Maintain Consistent Brand Profiles First, make sure all of your online profiles are consistent and accurate. When Google chooses which businesses to show for specific searches, the algorithm only chooses companies that have reliable information. If your company has five different phone numbers across seven different platforms, Google won’t know what to show, so it will likely omit your website from the results. On the other hand, if Google ‘sees’ the same phone number, address, and URL across all seven platforms, it’s more likely to choose your business when users say or type relevant local keywords. Your is a great place to start. Claim your listing and complete your profile. Including additional information on your profile makes it easier for Google to make fundamental decisions about the context of your website. Google My Business profile I also recommend checking your listing on popular online data aggregators, such as and . Foursquare Data Axle These companies compile data on online businesses and share it with smaller communities. If you synchronize all of these different platforms with one consistent set of information, local customers will have an easier time finding your company. Choose Keywords with Voice Search in Mind Voice search has quickly become one of the most popular ways for consumers to search the internet. In fact, estimates show that by the end of 2021, about of all online searches were conducted without a screen. 30% There are several reasons for this trend. First, smart speakers, such as Amazon’s Echo, are now more affordable than ever before. Because they are readily available and cheap, it makes sense that more people would have access to this technology. Another more prominent cause is every new smartphone comes with the ability to use voice search to browse online. This means that people who would otherwise never use this feature find themselves turning to their voice-activated device when they have a question or want to make an online purchase. If you’re wondering about the impact this has on eCommerce, consider this; nearly of people who own a smart speaker say they’ve used their device to buy something online. 62% Business leaders looking to optimize their website for local search should use conversational language and plenty of voice-specific keywords. The key to choosing the right words is to find out how your audience would search for your business with their voice instead of typing. For example, someone might type, “Steak dinner near me” when looking for a local restaurant. On the other hand, someone using a voice-activated device might say, “Where can I get a steak dinner?” Using the right keywords means your results are more likely to appear in the results gathered from the smart speaker. If used properly, content and offers that sound natural when spoken and feature local keywords see far more traffic and engagement when compared to companies without a voice search strategy. Optimize Your Site for Mobile Users Speaking of smartphones, your website will likely see a dip in local traffic if it’s not optimized for mobile users. You may be shocked to learn that the average person spends on their device every day. This eye-opening statistic shows why it’s so important to have a mobile responsive design. 3 hours and 40 minutes Imagine you’re ready to buy a brand new lawnmower, but you want to pick it up in person. You pull out your smartphone and look for stores with lawn mower models that meet your needs. If the website with the best offer isn’t optimized for mobile, you likely won’t see them in the results. Consequently, you’ll spend more to get the same product that you could have bought elsewhere. You don’t want to put potential customers in a similar position. When attempting to reach a local audience through mobile, two factors matter more than the rest. First, and performance can dramatically impact traffic and conversions. Research shows that a one-second delay in loading time can lead to a whopping loss in sales. your site’s overall speed 7% The second factor is accessibility. In other words, it doesn’t matter how fast your website loads if on-page text scrolls off the screen, images are broken, and there’s no option for mobile customer support. I suggest refining these two aspects of your mobile marketing strategy. Before long, you’ll likely see more local customers for your effort. Add Local Schema Markup Schema markup (also known as rich snippets and structured data) is another must-have marketing tool for businesses looking to reach more local customers. Even if the name is unfamiliar to you, there’s a good chance you’ve seen schema markup while browsing Google. Simply put, schema markup helps you get additional information included with the link to your website. For instance, if a customer is looking for a specific product, schema markup can let them know if it’s available. Similarly, if someone is interested in making a purchase, rich snippets make it easy to show users how many reviews the product has along with the rating. If you want to see what schema markup looks like for yourself, you can find out by doing a simple Google search for a product, service, or brand. Odds are, there’s at least one website out there with rich snippets around that topic. When you consider that of shoppers say they are more likely to trust a local business if they feature reviews, it’s not hard to see how this strategy can help you secure sales and engage with more local customers. 73% You can add a bunch of different markups to individual pages based on your industry and product selection. It’s easy to include schema markup for recipes, product descriptions, online course details, and much more. Think outside the box and use schema markup to make it even easier for local customers to decide where to spend their time and hard-earned money. Once you set up your schema markup, you can use Google’s to see where your business stands. Rich Results Test Get Involved in Your Community Finally, you can build a local audience by getting involved in your community. This step will vary depending on the needs of your audience, company resources, and the size of your city. But there are a few common ways you can get started. I recommend reaching out to local businesses that operate in the same industry. It’s worth noting that the partner company shouldn’t be a competitor. Instead, they should have an audience with similar goals, interests, and pain points. For example, an owner of a brick-and-mortar health food store might partner with local gyms. This type of partnership makes sense because the people going to the gym are also the same ones who are careful about what they eat. Think carefully about your business and what local companies would benefit from a partnership. You can then reach out to these business owners and exchange business cards, write guest posts for each other, and much more. Forming local partnerships in your community is an excellent way to spread brand awareness and reach people who may have never heard of your brand. Final Thoughts It’s clear that local SEO will continue to play a pivotal role in the success of brick-and-mortar and many online businesses. If you’re not connecting with these potential customers, you’re missing out. The tips discussed today will help you build an outline for your local search strategy. I suggest reviewing on-site data as you make changes. You’ll likely find plenty of hidden opportunities to rank for local keywords, reach more customers, and grow your small business.

How to Build a Strong Local SEO Strategy (5 Expert Tips)

The tech workforce in the US is not growing at an optimal pace. The number of schools offering computer science is not enough which is impacting the access of computer science to young women and students from marginalized communities. The truth is that there are over in the US but only graduated into the tech workforce last year. 410,020 open computing jobs 71,226 computer science students This is because only in the US offer computer science which deeply impacts its access to young women and students from marginalized communities. 47% of public high schools To address this pressing issue, we have launched #MyStartInTech, a campaign dedicated to drawing attention to this cause and in turn, help widen access to computer science in schools. Learn more about the campaign by visiting . www.startin.tech As part of this campaign, we present the #MyStartInTech interview series where some of the esteemed tech entrepreneurs and professionals in the industry share details about their journey in tech. With this, we hope to draw attention to the infinite opportunities that will lay open if young women and students are given the opportunity to study computer science. In this interview, Audrea Cook, Software Engineer at talks about how she got her start in the tech world. Raise.dev Audrea is an enthusiastic full-stack software engineer with a heart for effective communication. She pursued a wandering career path throughout her twenties and explored multiple industries and positions, all rooted in customer service and communication. As a result, she defined her purpose, honed her expertise, and discovered what brings joy and fulfillment into her professional life. Let’s find out what she has to say! When was your first interaction with Computer Science? I was one of the lucky ones in my high school to land a slot in the coveted web design class, which was only offered once a year. I was one of only three or four girls in the room. We spent the first week or so learning HTML and CSS basics, but I was disappointed when the teacher began extolling the virtues of WYSIWYG editors, which I (correctly) doubted I would ever use outside that class. I assumed my parents would never agree to spend money on web design software; why work hard building something as intangible as a web page? That was a hobby for nerds. Except, I am a nerd. I've always worn that badge with pride. I found myself immensely frustrated with my web design class because I just wanted to look at the code! If I wanted to play "Drag and Drop," I'd just muck around in PowerPoint. Ultimately, I wound up creating a project in class, saving screenshots of the layout to my handy dandy floppy disc, and then puzzling over how to recreate the pages at home in Notepad. My crowning achievement was a hideous "Animals A-Z" site with red text on a yellow background. Clearly, we didn't learn anything about accessibility (or taste) in that class. I continued to teach myself HTML and CSS by building Myspace profiles and Neopets pages. This was my first real entrance into the tech community, and I quickly realized there were multitudes of people on the Internet willing to help me learn; I just needed to ask. What nudged you into taking up a career in technology? For the longest time, I figured I could learn a bit of coding as a hobby, but it would never become a career. When I pictured a software engineer, I imagined a white man, your standard "tech bro," 100% of the time. We all know about Gates, Jobs, Zuckerberg, and their ilk, but the media spotlight rarely seems to shine on more diverse role models in tech. In 2019, I traveled on a business trip with my husband to Silicon Valley. I was in the middle of a disheartening job search pursuing any position I felt I was remotely qualified for, despite the fact I wasn't actually interested in a single option before me. I figured I needed to have a job to make ends meet, but it was unrealistic to expect I could make money and feel passionate about what I did. I could have one or the other, but not both. The first day we were in California, we had dinner with my husband's team. I met some very bright, extremely passionate software engineers, and half of them were women! Suddenly, I saw a new option. Here were these brilliant, kind, and unbelievably inspiring women living the dream. When I expressed my envy, one of the ladies at the table asked, "What's stopping you from joining us?" I realized I was the only real obstacle in my way. Within two weeks of that trip (and with my husband's unwavering support and encouragement), I postponed my job search and enrolled in Flatiron School's full-time boot camp. The rest, as they say, is history. What are your earliest memories of using a computer in school? I distinctly remember the rush of excitement I got any time my elementary school computer teacher instructed us to boot up the computer in DOS mode. DOS meant we weren't spending the class making WordArt or practicing using the home row. Oh, no. We were playing computer games, baby! I dominated Number Munchers, but like many a 90's kid, Oregon Trail absolutely destroyed me, usually with a broken axle or a bout of scarlet fever. What is the importance of technology to you now and how does it impact your day-to-day life? Technology is an integral part of my life. During the workday, I obviously focus on learning and writing code. I love that I get to spend my day solving challenging problems, squashing bugs, and leveling up my technical skills. It is so rewarding to be part of an industry that fosters creative thinking and lifelong learning. In my downtime, I typically engage with one form of tech or another. I use the wonder that is my smartphone to track my health, check out new books from the library, and find patterns and resources for my next crochet project. Video chat is perhaps the most meaningful form of technology in my life, particularly in the last year. With loved ones spread across the globe, I am beyond thankful for the ability to explore with my brother as he walks around the UK, to sing and dance with my niece and nephew in Georgia, and to judge for myself just how much my mom was faking when she said "I'm fine, really," while recovering from a thankfully minor bout of COVID-19. How important is it to increase access to computer science and technology to underrepresented communities and young women today? As I mentioned before, I never imagined myself in a technical role. I simply couldn't see people who look like me being successful in this industry. Of course, now that I have spent a few years as a member of the tech industry, I understand just how wrong I was. Now, I realize there are countless women, people of color, and members of the LGBTQIA+ community who are also fantastic role models in tech. To broaden diversity in our field, we need to feature and celebrate these individuals so curious onlookers can see themselves as the next big founder, software engineer, designer, or tech innovator. It's no secret the tech industry struggles with equal representation. By excluding women and underrepresented communities from computer science and technology, we not only do a great disservice to them, but we hinder the growth of the tech community as a whole. Imagine how bright our future will be if the best and brightest individuals from all perspectives and walks of life have the same opportunities to create and innovate in tech! The possibilities are endless. Why do you think access to computer literacy in school is important? The thing is, kids are sponges; they have an impressive ability to absorb knowledge. Given the right environment and support, it is amazing what students will learn and create. By providing early access to computer literacy, students are exposed to a world of new opportunities. Some of these kids will grow up to be our next big tech superstars, but studies show that simply incorporating technology into a lesson increases student engagement across the board, meaning our future doctors, teachers, and everything-elsers will be better prepared to pursue their passions, as well. Prior to my entry into tech, I was a second-grade teacher at a low-income public school. Many of my students lacked internet access at home and shared a single device (usually Mom or Dad's cell phone) across the whole family. Their only real exposure to computer literacy was through school, and we, as educators, were failing them. Our "computer labs'' were two overheated rooms with old, slow computers, many of which didn't work at all. In my second year at the school, we scrimped enough money from the budget to afford a computer literacy teacher, an entirely new position. That role was, unfortunately, the first to be cut the following year due to budget constraints. This was a huge eye-opener for me. I knew inequality was a problem in America, but it didn't hit home until I saw an entire school being denied learning opportunities in what I foolishly assumed was a core content area in the 21st Century. It is appalling that the students on one side of town have monthly STEM days, computer literacy enrichment, and a 1:1 device ratio while equally brilliant and imaginative kids on the other side of town are forced to do without, all based on their socio-economic status. A popular phrase in education is, "We're preparing students for careers that haven't even been invented yet." Common sense tells us the bulk of these careers will be at least tangentially related to the tech industry. How are teachers supposed to prepare their kids for this exciting future without actually giving them access to computer science and technology? If we ever hope to close this inequality gap between the status quo and underrepresented communities, it is vital we start in the schools. What do you think about .Tech Domains taking up this cause? I am thrilled to see .Tech Domains championing access to computer literacy. The sad truth in America is that public school teachers often take up this burden alone, donating their time and paying for supplies out of their own pockets. My greatest hope is other companies in our industry will be inspired by .Tech Domains' actions and find ways to contribute to the cause in their own communities and across the globe. When our children succeed, we succeed. What advice do you have for women and members of underrepresented communities just starting out in tech? Embrace the discomfort of not knowing and adopt a growth mindset. I’m wrapping up my first role as a professional software engineer with Raise.dev, and the greatest lesson I’ve learned thus far is that none of us know all the answers, and we all have something to teach one another. Your greatest asset will be the tech community itself. Reach out. I know this might sound scary. Being vulnerable, especially with total strangers, goes completely against our self-preserving instincts. I’m right there with you. As I’m looking to take the next step in my career, my gut says to put on a bold face and “fake it ‘til you make it.” I encourage you to join me in resisting this urge. Lean into those edges of your knowledge. Be honest about what you know and express a willingness to learn. The community will lift you up. We want to see you do well because we know your success and participation in tech will only enrich the community. Learn more about #MyStartInTech campaign and lend your support at . www.startin.tech

#MyStartInTech: An Interview With Audrea Cook, a Software Engineer

THE ENTERTAINMENT OF MR. DIRECK REACHES A CLIMAX

Cloud-in-a-box originally seemed like the perfect compromise, letting enterprises reinvent their aging data centers for today’s IT, built around a cloud-based model. It offered some of the important advantages of public cloud, like better optimization of computer resources and self-service. But looking at catastrophic failures of promising cloud-in-a-box solutions, most prominently , a well-funded startup offering IT departments everything they said they wanted, we have to ask: Is cloud-in-a-box (really just another name for private cloud) truly the way forward? the recent shutdown of Stratoscale Cloud-in-a-box solutions claimed ease of setup, rapid deployment, compatibility, and control. Some achieved this through hybrid solutions and new equipment. Others promised backwards compatibility with a range of existing hardware. But one by one, promising offerings have fallen victim to harsh realities. I a few years ago, specifically when dealing with Openstack cloud. predicted some of these occurrences And despite the perceived benefits mentioned above, the simple reality is that private cloud contradicts the core promise of cloud: infinite scale. That’s even more true today and even more crucial to understand as more and more modern “native-cloud” applications are being developed to support usage at scale. And it’s not clear at this point that even today’s heavyweights—solutions coming from the leading vendors, including Azure Arc and Outposts—can overcome core problems with the cloud-in-a-box model. High-Profile Failures To understand whether today’s cloud-in-a-box solutions can emerge as winners, let’s look at two recent high-profile failures in the field. The first example that comes to mind was the . It was built on OpenStack, and promised full AWS compatibility. purchased-by-Dell EMC and now-defunct Cloudscaling While Cloudscaling was driven by its passionate founder Randy Bias, , its offering was “too early and too incomplete.” according to TechCrunch But perhaps the most recent and devastating failure has been Stratoscale, whose core product, Symphony, was built around a great idea. Symphony was a subscription-based cloud built on existing hardware, with AWS and VMware compatibility. It was founded by serial entrepreneur Ariel Maislos, whose previous startup was acquired by Apple for a reported $390 million. In short order, from companies like Intel, Cisco, Qualcomm, and SanDisk. Stratoscale raised $70 million in funding It also formed industry alliances with partners like HP, OpenStack, and Lenovo. Yet in December 2019, after an unsuccessful merger, Stratoscale shut down for good. Tellingly, on “a technological switch in which the giants dictate the direction of the market.” Maislos blamed the shutdown [Disclaimer: IOD served Stratoscale for several years, helping them build a successful online presence with a vast amount of technical expert-based content.] Giving Customers What They Want? These were all good products, offering exactly what the enterprise clients said they wanted: a simple cloud package that the traditional enterprise IT team could own, including control, backwards compatibility, and interoperability. But this seems to be a perfect example of a situation where what the industry says it wants and what it actually needs are two very different things. Private cloud and cloud-in-a-box have been driven by two faulty and intertwined assumptions. The first is the old-school belief that companies must control their own hardware. And the second is that in regulated industries, there’s no choice: It’s private cloud or no cloud. Yet while these cloud-in-a-box offerings rose and fell, AWS and Azure were driving innovation at many times the pace. Meaning that by nature, many public cloud capabilities simply don’t—and never will—exist on-site, and not only because of the infinite scale of public cloud. Even in regulated industries, objections to public clouds are disappearing. Private data center operators can’t keep up with today’s massive security challenges that also come with the ability to scale. Indeed, public cloud is seeing widespread adoption even in regulated industries like healthcare, which have traditionally kept their data on lockdown. , nearly 77% of healthcare providers used public cloud in 2018. According to IDC research Bringing the power of public cloud in-house is like reinventing the wheel. Any attempt to create a better wheel (shaped like a triangle? adding another axle?) will be overly complex and expensive and won’t work nearly as well. The Future of Cloud-in-a-Box Back in 2016, naysayers claimed that “ , particularly when it comes to ensuring consistent application performance, compliance and security.” public cloud can’t solve every business challenge They also warned that public cloud brought risks of service interruptions due to being “over reliant on a single provider.” Ironic words today, when local data centers are more likely to experience interruptions than a “five-nines” reliability public cloud. At the most recent re:Invent conference, I attended an analyst briefing on AWS Outposts, and came away with the impression that the only real arguments left for cloud-in-a-box are specific regulation rules and latency. When it comes to a network with public cloud resources, it still may not be fast enough for demanding local enterprise applications such as mobile gaming. Outposts try to fix this by bringing their flavor of public cloud into the organization’s data center, closer to the user, or maybe it's just the need to have these irons closer to the traditional IT leader of this organization?! (Yes, I am being cynical) There are a few major differences between the two: , essentially a turnkey hybrid hardware/software solution. AWS promises “install, configure, launch” simplicity, at a cost of a quarter of a million to $1 million per unit ( from AWS’s site). Outposts is completely AWS-compatible, because it is AWS. It behaves like just another region in your AWS console, allowing a hybrid public-private setup. Outposts is simpler to set up and configure sample pricing Microsoft, on the other hand, was first to market and has more experience delivering enterprise services. Flexibility is the buzzword here, as Azure Stack has the advantage of offering compatibility with a range of hardware provider partners, like Dell, Cisco, and Lenovo. Microsoft also takes a flexible approach to support within the Azure Resource Manager (ARM) for resources running outside of Azure, including VMware vSphere, Amazon EC2, Google Compute Engine, or any Windows or Linux server, even if it's behind a firewall and proxy. Pricing starts at $0.008 per virtual CPU per hour, plus software support. Hardware support is contracted through the OEM provider partner, making maintenance, upgrades, and future compatibility more complex. (ComputerWorld offers .) a helpful roundup of the major cloud providers’ approaches One final important commonality: that supports limited competition. While Azure offers more flexibility, Outposts doesn’t accommodate third-party vendors or integrate with non-AWS environments. buying into an oligopolistic model The cost of these cloud-in-a-box solutions is already high, and besides the fact that there are so few options on the market today, I’m not sure moving in this direction is the right strategy for any large organization. Solving the Problems? Beyond superficial similarities and differences, we need to ask: Do AWS’s or Microsoft’s approaches fix the problems with private cloud? Both address latency issues, but at the expense of control and sophistication. Neither dares to claim anymore that private cloud offers greater security or easier compliance, though . this was originally a core marketing point for Azure Stack And even the latency argument is quickly losing relevance. : like AWS Local Zones, offering local internet ingress and egress to reduce latency; AWS Wavelength, offering delivery of ultra-low latency applications for 5G devices, and partnerships with other major telecom players, including KDDI and SK Telecom. AWS already has a few great strategies planned to address latency All of these will very soon solve the latency problem for high-demand applications like gaming, 3D modeling, and electronic design automation, by effectively moving public cloud closer to home, solutions which promise to leave private cloud in the dust. Since these are limited in nature, cloud-in-a-box, will always be harder to use and offer less functionality. And we all know how easy and convenient public clouds are. As a half a decade ago, "In this race for convenience, anything that feels harder than the public cloud seems certain to fail." Asay, who joined the AWS team in 2019, seems to have anticipated today’s state of cloud-in-a-box: “The very notion of a privately provisioned cloud service is contradictory and nearly always doomed. Private cloud lets enterprises pretend to be innovative, embracing pseudo-cloud computing even as they dress up antiquated IT in fancy nomenclature." TechRepublic’s Matt Asay prophetically wrote Conclusion Today, many cloud-native organizations have never owned their infrastructure—and they’re doing fine. Better than fine. They’ve discovered that hardware is a heavy liability, not an asset. This includes players like Airbnb, Netflix, and Tesla, and many others in highly secure industries. Lyft made waves with its IPO in 2019 by announcing that it would be leasing its entire infrastructure from AWS, to the tune of $1.5 billion over five years. Innovative businesses care less about infrastructure investment and more about flexibility, reliability, and scalability on demand. Improvements in public cloud have already addressed security and compliance, and are now doing the same for latency. Public cloud just keeps getting better and better, while private cloud—including cloud-in-a-box—races to keep up. It’s a race no one can win.

Axle Health

axlehealth.com

11-50 employees

Since 2020

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Axle Health

axlehealth.com

11-50 employees

Since 2020

COMPANY RANKING

AXLE HEALTH

EVERGREEN INDEX #1878

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