by Merrill R. (Rick) Chapman, Managing Editor, Softletter The advent of the “Cloud” has brought about the biggest buzz word explosion seen in high-tech since the 80s, when everybody was fighting over who was more WYSIWIG, relational, and16-bit. Not to mention Microsoft repeating the phrase “rich text” to the point where we were all practically in tears. It's the type of thing this acronym-crazed high-tech does. As I've written in the past, the “Cloud” is the most vaporous buzzword yet produced in the business. In and of itself, the term “Cloud” has no meaning except as a synonym for “Internet.” However, this hasn't stopped pundits, the press, bloggers and anyone who can put word to “paper” from creating an endless series of articles about the “Cloud.” Articles that start off with titles that tell you nothing about the piece's actual topic. Here's a recent example of what I mean. Cloud Computing: Piracy Killer Or New Infringement Avenue? (http://www.crn.com/news/cloud/240006089/cloud-computing-piracy-killer-or-new-infringement-avenue.htm) Halfway through the article's first paragraph, you discover that the actual topic is SaaS and that the rest of the piece, despite the obligatory scattering of meaningless Cloud nouns throw into the text, (“dark clouds, “gray clouds”, etc.) makes perfect sense if...