Carbonite vs. Mozy: My Real-Life Cloud-Based Backup Experiences

I, like many of you, lived in fear of reaching for my trusty MacBook one day, only to have it not respond or to have lost all of my precious work and personal information and files. So when Mozy started advertising on TV (and I got my wife a new MacBook and she started loading important stuff on it, too), I signed us both up. (I thought Apple’s MobileMe offered features I didn’t want or need, and Mozy was cheaper.)

Why cloud-based backup? Two reasons. One, if I bought an external hard drive and backed all of our data up onto it, the data was still at risk, if something catastrophic struck our home. (This is why I also eschewed Apple’s Time Machine application.) Two, cloud-based backup means that at least in theory, I could recover critical files from almost anything running a Web browser. A nice safety net in case my laptop failed while on the road, thought I.

I was a very happy Mozy user for a good while – the software downloaded and installed with almost no intervention from me, and after the first backup, which took place over several days, everything would be updated invisibly to me and my wife, as Mozy promised. But then, a few weeks ago, stuff just stopped working. And the same software that had been backing up our stuff invisibly was now not doing so, and not telling me anything useful about why it had stopped working.

So I dutifully visited the Mozy online support portal. Or rather, I tried to, but kept getting weird errors referring to Salesforce.com, the cloud-based software Mozy apparently used for customer care and relationship management. To make a long, painful story short, once I finally got into the online support portal, I discovered that Mozy had released a new version of its Windows software, and that both Mac and Windows users were complaining in large numbers and backups that had been working but were no longer.

I posted a note about my problem, and found out that mine was not the same one the other Mac users were having. Wonderful news. I e-mailed Mozy support twice, got automated acknowledgements of my e-mails, then radio silence. Meanwhile, I went without regular backups for days, then weeks.

Finally, I broke down and downloaded the free Carbonite software, which also downloaded and installed with minimal intervention from or confusion for me. And I have to say that Carbonite was even more invisible than Mozy had been during the initial multi-day backup. But I wasn’t really excited about starting all over again with a new vendor. So I visited the Mozy support portal and e-mailed Mozy support again. This time, though, I found the name and e-mail address of Mozy’s press contact and copied him as well as the support address.

Within a day, I got an e-mail from an actual human being, one Brittney Mitchell. With Brttney’s intervention, everything changed, and changed quickly. She apologized for my problems, inspected my log files and determined that my account was misbehaving because I had failed to update an expired credit card. (Why their software wasn’t smart enough to tell me this explicitly from the beginning of my problem is still unclear to me. Brittney said that part of the problem was that I signed up without going through a salesperson, who would have flagged such a thing. I countered that not having to go through a salesperson was one of the reasons I’d signed up in the first place. Sigh.)

Once I updated my credit card information and downloaded the latest Mozy client software, backups started happening again for me and my wife. Meanwhile, Brittney informed me that part of the reason for Mozy’s initial lack of responsiveness was that the company was moving support call handling from India to the US and dealing with a deluge of requests and a lack of trained responders. (Brittney had only been with the company for a month when she took up my issues, she wrote.)

Meanwhile, the Carbonite software was working just fine – but no one ever responded to the e-mail questions I sent to that company. All I got was the automated reminders that my free access was about to expire and that I should subscribe – messages I received after cancelling my trial account. Sigh.

The bottom line: I’d have to recommend Mozy over Carbonite, not because I know of anything particularly lacking in Carbonite, but because Mozy finally came through when I had support questions that needed answers. I also believe that Mozy moving support to the US should improve things for all users, not just me or those using Mozy for the Mac. (I don’t know where Carbonite user support is based, because I’ve never received a personal response from them.) Also, Mozy is owned by EMC, a company that knows a bit about backup, at least from the enterprise perspective.

Carbonite make have a slight edge over Mozy because Carbonite offers an app with the ability to restore individual files on demand to an iPad, an iPhone or a Wi-Fi-equipped iPod touch, but I don’t expect Mozy to allow this gap to exist for long. Ultimately, the Mozy-vs.-Carbonite discussion may come down to distinctions that make little difference. But to me, either is far better than no cloud-based backup at all. But what do YOU think?

EnterpriseWizard: A, If Not The, Future of Business Applications

Where business software is concerned, last year’s big question was, "Why can’t business applications be as easy to use as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter?"

This year's question should be, "Why aren't business application development, alignment with key business processes and process optimization as easy as building Facebook pages or blogs and Web sites with Weebly or Google Sites?”

I know, it's overly long, but it's still a good question.

As I see it, two key obstacles stand in the way of legacy/traditional approaches to business applications and business process automation.

• Adaptation – legacy/traditional approaches are notoriously difficult, expensive, time-consuming or impossible to adapt to specific business processes, needs or goals.
• Adoption – in part because of their adaptation limitations, legacy/traditional approaches almost never achieve sufficient user adoption levels to drive high, consistent or sustained business value.

A more modern approach should enable rapid development and deployment with almost limitless adaptation abilities, to drive high, rapid adoption and measurable, significant and sustainable business value. Such an approach should also enable creation of applications for key business tasks, aligned with and driven by easily captured, executed and automated business processes.

I believe that one of the first real-life examples of such an approach is being taken by Colin Earl and his merry little band at a software company called EnterpriseWizard. And that's all I'm going to tell you here, at least for now. You can read more about EnterpriseWizard and why I think what I do about the company in a Brief I wrote for Focus.com -- "Integrated Collaboration, Communication and Process Automation in the Cloud: EnterpriseWizard." Then, you should visit the EnterpriseWizard Web site, paying particular attention to the user success stories, which span a range of use cases and company sizes.

EnterpriseWizard isn't for every company's every software need. But I believe it is a bellwether for how many business applications are likely to be built and delivered in the future. And I mean the near-term future, as is starting...oh, pretty much now.

Can CA acquire its way into cloud management market leadership?

Since mid-2009, CA (the former Computer Associates) has acquired data center automation assets and expertise from Cassatt, as well as the companies NetQoS (network performance management and service delivery management solutions) and Oblicore (IT service level management software). This week, CA announced plans to buy 3Tera, a pioneering provider of solutions for building and deploying cloud-based services.

CA is clearly positioning itself as a "one-stop shop" for solutions to manage both cloud-based and premise-based IT infrastructures. But CA faces a growing range of competitors, particularly where cloud-based infrastructure management is concerned. (See the Focus Brief "Infrastructure Management 'In the Cloud:' Why Now May Be the Time at Your Business" at http://bit.ly/HostedITManagement.) And CA has a long and decidedly uneven history of successfully integrating and leveraging acquired companies, their people and assets.

So can CA extend its leadership in premise-based IT management into the cloud successfully?

Well, I'm not convinced. And I'm not the only one asking. As Matthew McKenzie, Senior Editor at Enterprise Efficiency, a site you should check out and bookmark, wrote in his piece, "CA Builds a Solid Strategy on Cloud Acquisitions, "It's up to CA to put the pieces together and build a truly valuable software stack for its customers. I see that happening, and I also see CA offering a lot of long-term value for IT executives with private- or hybrid-cloud development plans. But this time around, one thing is clear: Milking these acquisitions like a bunch of sickly cash cows simply is not an option."

True and well said. Having followed CA since its inception, I am both cautiously hopeful and at least a little wary. But I have no real stake in what happens. If you do or your company does, however, I'd advise you to watch CA closely, especially for signs that top people from its acquisitions are leaving or have left. I also recommend that if you do business with CA, you demand a briefing about its cloud-related road map, under a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) if need be. That will at least help you to set a baseline for comparing what CA says to what CA does. Close alignment between the two is good; non-alignment is a cause for concern -- as is a lack of useful, actionable information from the company.

Lots has happened and continues to happen at CA. Whether all this activity translates into actual change or progress is still an open question. Caveat emptor. And in the meantime, come on over to Focus.com to discuss, at http://bit.ly/CAandtheCloud. Thanks!

Sendside: Sales Automation and Acceleration as a Service – SaaaaS!

Let’s start with some disclosures. Before I became Director of Research at Focus, I consulted with Sendside, and am a big fan of the company and its management team. So it’s with at least a small dash of personal pride that I write about the company here – but you can and should still take my opinions at least semi-seriously.

That said, observers and pundits, including Gartner, are increasingly saying that if and as the economy begins to improve, one of the first things areas in which companies are going to re-start spending is in sales. Specifically, companies seem likely to invest in solutions that will help them make more sales more quickly and more inexpensively.

Hard to argue with logic like that. No better way to accelerate economic recovery than to shorten sales cycles and increase sales numbers. But how best to do so?

I would argue that anything that helps to engage, inform, persuade and invite prospects to take further action – like, for example, to give your offering a try – is a likely winner here. And I believe Sendside has developed a platform and an architecture that can help almost any company do all of these things, in ways that are automated, repeatable, scalable, economical and effective.

With Sendside, you can combine traditional e-mail with all kinds of other communications, in a variety of formats. What’s really cool, however, is that you can combine these into packages that are as easy to send, receive, open and share as a typical e-mail. No more convoluted combining of documents, spreadsheets, marketing collateral and what-have-you. No more bulky, slow-to-send-and-download giant e-mails. And no more concerns about whether or not your recipient has all of the software necessary to read/see what you’ve sent the way you meant for it to be read/seen. Your electronic outreach is faster, easier, less intrusive and confusing and more likely to be more readily consumed and more effective.

What’s more, Sendside can tell you who’s received what, who’s opened what, and when they did so. This makes following up – what sales and marketing people sometimes refer to as “lead nurturing” – easier, more consistent, and more effective. It can also greatly accelerate sales cycles and prospect conversion.

You can learn a lot more by visiting www.sendside.net and downloading one or both of the white papers I wrote for them before joining Focus. One takes an IT-centric view, while the other is more business-focused. Then, check out the Sendside solution itself. Ask the Sendside team to send you a Sendside package, then maybe get yourself a personal Sendside account so you can send some packages to your colleagues. Then, let the Sendside team and me know what you think.

(By the way, if you haven’t read them yet, I also have some thoughts on Microsoft’s new Office Web Applications and their implications for Web-based collaboration. They’re over at my DortchOnCollaboration blog. You might find those interesting as well.)

10 Signs that It May be Time to Consider Software as a Service (SaaS)

Greetings, and many apologies -- it's been a hectic past couple of months, and I'm now neck-deep in a consulting engagement that I'm hoping turns into a full-time job soon. Said engagement is with Focus (http://www.focus.com), which aims to help buyers of business technologies to make better, more considered purchase decisions. Anyway, I've just published my first piece of contributed Focus research, "10 Signs that It May be Time to Consider Software as a Service (SaaS)," and would be extremely grateful if you were to visit the Focus Web site to read it. It's at http://www.focus.com/ugr/how-to/hosting-bandwidth/10-signs-it-may-be-time-consider-software-service-saas/. Many thanks, and more soon, I promise!

3Qs, 3As and 3Rs with Treb Ryan of OpSource

So I'm wondering, where best to get some interesting insights (beyond my own, of course!) on SaaS and cloud computing right now? And I figure it makes sense to ask someone who makes a living helping to enable commercial pursuit of those technologies.

(See, it's out-of-the-box thinking like that that's why we industry analysts and commentators garner the huge levels of respect and remuneration we enjoy. But I digress.)

So I came up with three basic, yet insightful questions, and ran them by my respected industry colleague Treb Ryan, CEO of OpSource. Treb's company provides solutions that enable “cloud operations for serious SaaS and Web businesses,” as it says at its Web site. OpSource has a strong partner ecosystem, a pragmatic business focus, and as you'll see below, a pretty sharp CEO.

Dortch: What is the single greatest challenge to success for software providers seeking to deliver SaaS/on-demand solutions?

Ryan: The single greatest challenge of success for a SaaS company is the cost of customer acquisition. Traditional sales models when applied to SaaS [are] very expensive [ways] to grow your business. SaaS companies should look at low-cost customer acquisition strategies, such as free on-line trials, “freemium” products or a robust channel base, to help lower the cost of customer acquisition.

Dortch: What is the single greatest challenge to success for enterprises seeking to deploy business-critical SaaS/on-demand solutions?

Ryan: For companies deploying mission-critical SaaS [or cloud-based on-demand solutions] it [is] usually integration with your existing SaaS and non-SaaS data – ensuring, for example, that you don't have a separate employee record for example in your Taleo [on-demand talent management solution] implementation than you do in you payroll system.

Dortch: What do you see as the next "great leap forward" for the SaaS/on-demand solutions market – technological, organizational, perceptual or otherwise?

Ryan: Ubiquitous APIs [application programming interfaces]. All SaaS data and interactions will be available as standardized API calls to any other cloud application. This will solve the integration question, open up new channels in the form of value-added solutions and really open the SaaS world [up] to whole new levels of innovative cloud applications based on multiple data sources and interfaces. Think of the unified contact [management features] on the new Palm Pre that brings in information from Facebook, LinkedIn, your personal [contacts] and [Microsoft] Exchange. Very cool.

First off, big thanks to Treb for the time and the interesting observations and insights. Now, my recommendations.

If you are or wish to become a successful SaaS or cloud-based solution provider, unless your solutions focus specifically on IT infrastructure management and optimization, try to stay the heck out of that business. Getting into it if you aren't there already is not only asking for trouble, it's almost guaranteed to make customer acquisition and other operational imperatives more expensive and difficult. It also flies in the face of the primary benefits of SaaS and the cloud.

If you are deploying or wish to deploy SaaS or cloud-based solutions, you should start with a clear, detailed plan of what specific business goal(s) or benefit(s) you're trying to achieve. That plan should include a detailed assessment of current relevant assets, including the information driving business decisions, actions and processes today. You may find that you need a foundation of accurate, consistent and timely information before you need any new SaaS or cloud-based solution. (See my SearchSAP.com column, “For MDM, start by getting to know your enterprise data” for more on this – it's importance extends way beyond SaaS and the cloud.)

Whether you are or want to be a SaaS/cloud-based solution provider, user or both, focus your attention on technologies, providers and partners that support open, well-documented APIs. Even if you never write a line of code, APIs represent a safety net of interoperability and integration that can smooth and increase the business value of your SaaS/cloud-based solution. It can also help keep you away from that nasty infrastructure stuff I mentioned earlier.

More from some of those I consider “the few with a clue” in upcoming outings. If you've got subjects or people to suggest, or questions or comments, do please let me know here and/or at medortch@dortchonit.com.

Heard of Rearden Commerce Yet? You Will...and Soon!

How about an on-demand, electronic personal assistant that can help you and your company save money – as much as 40 percent – on travel, shipping and almost everything else you and your colleagues do or use?

Is that a value proposition that gets your attention, or that of your CFO or CEO? If not, either I'm not being sufficiently clear, or you should be seriously considering a job change. I'll try again; you do what you think you need to do after reading a bit more.

Rearden Commerce provides an on-demand platform linking business users with services ranging from hotel, air travel and car rental reservations to airport parking, conferencing, shipping, international mobile telephony and expense management and reporting.

Rearden forms alliances with providers, negotiates discounts wherever possible, and sometimes acquires companies outright. For example, Rearden now owns ExpenseWire, developers of the expense management solution resold by leading payroll processing provider Paychex and the Orbitz for Business travel service. It also owns Global Ground Automation, developers of software that automates ground transportation reservation management. Strategic allies include American Express, JP Morgan Chase (watch this one!) and the above-mentioned Paychex. Rearden claims that more than 160,000 suppliers and partners are using its platform to deliver services to more than 4 thousand corporate customers and 2 million users.

All this means you or your company can take advantage of in-place discounts negotiated directly or by Rearden, or price-shop among available competitors Rules-driven software ensures spend management and the best available price on each purchase. And it's all accessible via a single interface, the Rearden Personal Assistant, which runs on computers and a growing range of mobile devices.

Unified business service access and spend management as an on-demand service. If reining in costs while providing easy access and choice gets any better than this for business users, whether corporate or individual, someone please show or tell me – but until that happens, if you run a business, work for a business, or are a business and you consume business services, you've got to check out Rearden Commerce. I think it's a prime example of a SaaS solution that delivers business benefits across the entire value chain, from service providers to the companies and individuals that do business with them – with (almost) no IT infrastructure required.