Tech Talk: An encounter with a Cloud and some War Lessons

A few weeks back, if someone had asked me about clouds, I would have talked about stratocumulus, cumulonimbus, and nimbostratus. But when you have highly passionate tech experts in your syndicate, you are bound to catch the buzzing jargon in everyday conversations. Happened with me as well, and I came to know that the shape of the cloud is much more extensive than I had imagined.

Peer to peer learning is an integral part of the management education system, and our syndi started the show with a bang. My mates have launched a series of Tech Talks that would cover the different tangs of technology. Technology was something that used to give me indigestion, but after the first session itself, even a novice like me has started to relish its flavors.

Our first session was on Cloud Fundamentals. 

We started with a discussion on basic architecture, server farms, hypervisor, docker engine, and differences between traditional, virtual, and container deployments. Words like on-premise, IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS were slowly introduced to my vocabulary. Different examples of apps, services, and scenarios were explored to understand the concepts better. What made it extra savory was using Pizza as an example, and how to categorize the different ways one can get hold of a Pizza in terms of On-premise, IaaS, PaaS, and SaaS.

Image: https://www.svenvanleuken.com/

?And it was not only about Clouds.

What's a story without some history? And what's history, without some wars?

I never knew that the browser I use every day has such a fascinating history attached to it. The Mozilla Foundation, the Open-source codes, Phoenix, Firefox, Opera, Chrome, are all made from the same pixie dust. And when our Tech Talks turned into the period of browser wars, I felt I was watching another episode of Game of Thrones, dazzled with the strategies of House Netscape and House Microsoft. And just as a person feels after watching GOT for the first time after repeated cajoling from his friends, I too felt the same way. Why haven't I explored this part of the world earlier!

Listening to the stories of Marc Andreessen, Ben Horowitz, Peter Thiel, and Elon Musk, not only our Tech-related knowledge got enriched, but we also gained valuable business as well as life lessons. The exciting tidbits from real-life work experiences shared by my teammates made the whole peer-to-peer learning experience profoundly insightful and highly enjoyable.

After this session, I am still a novice, I still fear the tech terminologies, but now I have the courage to face them. Now I am ready to take the plunge in the ocean and learn swimming, because I know I have an expert group of lifeguards with me.

We have many more Tech Talks planned, and I am looking forward to another walk in the Clouds. And if I am lucky, I might see a rainbow too.