Under the mattress or in the bank?
Monday, November 30, 2009 at 06:00AM I don't know about you, but I like to keep a few hundred thousand dollars worth of gold bullion around just in case of natural disaster or if Sarah Palin ever gains national office*.
The question is - where to keep it?
I have a number of options
- I can keep it nice and close where I can keep my eye on it - under my bed.
- I can buy a home safe and keep it locked.
- I can rent a safe deposit box and keep it in a bank.
The first two of these options certainly offer some psychological comfort. Knowing that those Krugerrands are close - where I can touch them, see them and protect them - on the surface might might seems like the safest course of action. After all, I have the biggest stake in keeping my stash secure.
But on reflection, most of us quickly realize that one's valuables are safest in the bank. The bank employs professional security staff. Its safe is a lot bigger and stronger than what I can afford. And banks offer some degree of insurance against loss.
Yes, banks are sometimes robbed and one could get mugged carrying one's loot to or from the bank, but the odds of those things happening are minscule compared to have one's home burgled. Electronic fund transfers, using a bill pay service and doing automatic deducations are all safer and more reliable than writing a paper check.
So if it make sense to keep one's physical valuables in a bank, why does it not also make sense to keep one's data (like e-mail) on an ASP - an application service provider? These off-site, professional services like GMail hire professional staff, give strong security to users, and maintain 99.9% uptime rates. It's like keeping your data in a bank instead of under your mattress (or on your harddrive).
Jeffrey Kaplan in CIO writes: "Although service disruptions experienced by Google ... get plenty of attention, those types of incidents don't happen very often, and they don't last as long as many enterprise outages. And there hasn't been a major compromise of a SaaS operation reported yet, even as we continue to read regular accounts of security breaches in traditional IT environments."
*I am just kidding. Please don't burgle my house. Or if you do, please take some of the left over turkey.
Reader Comments (3)
You make a good point. The problem, in my case anyway, is upload bandwidth and input latency. Without several megabits per second upload, it isn't feasible to store large data files, photo archives, or music online.
I also don't use webmail due to the speed and convenience of using a local client like Thunderbird. I'm a very demanding computer user, and even minor delays in online applications frustrate me to no end. It's wasted time, and it's not like I can shift to another task for 1-3 seconds while the page refreshes. The thought of manipulating folders and moving emails online is not a pleasant one for me.
That, in my opinion, is the sole practical downfall of online applications, including any online operating system. When they respond as rapidly as local apps, I'm all for it.
P.S. I was expecting a somewhat different disclaimer at the asterisk. I chuckled heartily when I didn't find it.
This is an interesting way to think about it--I guess it could be argued that our trust in banks has been broken by many financial institutions' recent decisions, but I still use a bank. I also still use Gmail and Google Docs, even with the privacy warnings ringing in my ears. This actually makes me feel a bit of relief.
Hi Clint,
I think you could overcome the latency issue of Gmail by using GoogleGears, a Firefox helper app, that lets you work in an offline mode. Do all your email, then sync, which is basically what a machine based client does anyway. Oh, I think you can use Thunderbird or other clients with Gmail if it does IMAP, too.
We need to get you a faster connection!
All the best,
Doug
Hi Libby,
I still trust my local bank. Not so sure about the ones that are "too big to fail." Out of my area of expertise, I'll tell you that!
All the best,
Doug