Cloud to rule over desktops in the next decade

BANGALORE, INDIA: Experts say that cloud computing will become more dominant than the desktop in the next decade.

In other words, most users will perform most computing and communicating activities through connections to servers operated by outside firms.

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This is according to Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project and Elon University’s Imagining the Internet Center's fourth 'Future of the Internet' survey of 895 technology stakeholders and critics.

Moreover, most people will access software applications online and share and access information through the use of remote server networks by 2020, instead of depending primarily on tools and information housed on their individual, personal computers.

Among the most popular cloud services now are social networking sites (the 500 million people using Facebook are being social in the cloud), webmail services such as Hotmail and Yahoo mail, microblogging and blogging services such as Twitter and WordPress, video-sharing sites such as  YouTube, picture-sharing sites such as Flickr, document and applications sites such as Google Docs, social-bookmarking sites such as Delicious, business sites like eBay, and ranking, rating and commenting sites such as Yelp and TripAdvisor.

This does not mean, however, that most of these experts think the desktop computer will disappear soon. The majority sees a hybrid life in the next decade, as some computing functions move towards the cloud and others remain based on personal computers, the report adds.