Cloud computing

Abstract

Cloud computing refers to the ability to rent computer processing power, file storage, and network bandwidth from third party providers with a flexible utility-like payment model. Historically, the demand for computing capacity required a capital investment in quantities of computer hardware, networking, and storage devices. Additionally, housing this equipment required specially conditioned rooms with adequate power and cooling as well as trained staff to maintain these environments. In the modern era, offloading these demands to a dedicated cloud provider allows users to pay only a "rental fee" for their computing needs at any given moment. A sports network may utilize cloud computing to live-stream a high-demand sporting event to millions of devices or to analyze statistical data for an entire sports league. The sports network will only pay for the cloud services utilized and will not be required to own and maintain servers themselves.