"HOW DO YOU MEASURE COMPUTING CONSUMPTION?
'We're looking for that single unit of measurement that will be the tech industry's equivalent of the kilowatt,' says Bernardo Huberman, a director at Hewlett-Packard's research laboratories. Identifying and agreeing on such a unit is essential to the future success of the much-hyped initiative called 'utility computing,' touted by tech giants HP, IBM and Sun Microsystems. Currently, the three companies offer a jumble of pricing schemes for their utility-computing offerings, but all agree that finding a simple and standard way to measure and charge for computer use would enable the nascent market to really take off. At HP's labs, researchers have coined the term 'computon' -- a mix of 'photon' and 'computation' -- to describe the unit, but coming up with exactly what a computon is, isn't as easy. The problem is that unlike a kilowatt, a computon can't be a strictly scientific quantity. It must cover aspects such as data-storage capacity and processing power, and must be flexible enough to accommodate the evolving needs of customers. 'Ten to 20 years from now, you might see computing companies as closer to the electrical utility of today,' says Nick van der Zweep, HP's director of utility computing. 'Tech companies will have big computer-processing generation stations all over the world, and there may be meters on everybody's houses measuring how much computing power they use.' (Wall Street Journal 17 Jul 2003) "
Source: NewsScan Daily: July 17, 2003
'We're looking for that single unit of measurement that will be the tech industry's equivalent of the kilowatt,' says Bernardo Huberman, a director at Hewlett-Packard's research laboratories. Identifying and agreeing on such a unit is essential to the future success of the much-hyped initiative called 'utility computing,' touted by tech giants HP, IBM and Sun Microsystems. Currently, the three companies offer a jumble of pricing schemes for their utility-computing offerings, but all agree that finding a simple and standard way to measure and charge for computer use would enable the nascent market to really take off. At HP's labs, researchers have coined the term 'computon' -- a mix of 'photon' and 'computation' -- to describe the unit, but coming up with exactly what a computon is, isn't as easy. The problem is that unlike a kilowatt, a computon can't be a strictly scientific quantity. It must cover aspects such as data-storage capacity and processing power, and must be flexible enough to accommodate the evolving needs of customers. 'Ten to 20 years from now, you might see computing companies as closer to the electrical utility of today,' says Nick van der Zweep, HP's director of utility computing. 'Tech companies will have big computer-processing generation stations all over the world, and there may be meters on everybody's houses measuring how much computing power they use.' (Wall Street Journal 17 Jul 2003) "
Source: NewsScan Daily: July 17, 2003