Coming off a recent partnership with Amazon Web Services for efficient workload migration, Eucalyptus reiterates its mantra for flexible cloud environments.  And with the vision of CEO Marten Mickos, known for his early involvement with MySQL (sold to Sun Microsystems in 2008), Eucalyptus takes an open approach to cloud clusters and Services in anticipation of tomorrow’s computing demands.

In today’s  Snapshot Profile we get a closer look at Micko’s ideas around the cloud, which he calls a social network for computers, the lessons he’s learned from MySQL’s evolution, and what the perfect smart home system looks like.

What’s your vision of a social network for computers (aka The Cloud?)

The social network for computers is a vision we have at Eucalyptus. In olden days, people knew so few other people that they easily could manage their network themselves. As people started interacting with many more people and across long distances, social networks on the internet became essential.

Similarly, as the number of servers in a datacenter grows, and as you try to manage them all in a uniform way, you need something that looks like a “social network” for computers. For instance, in an ideal cloud, any new servers added to the cloud would be configured and brought up to speed by the other servers, just as in a social network, new connections are being welcomed into the circle.

What’s your dream smart home system?

I have a dream of a smart home system that on its own manages all aspects of energy, heating, cooling, lighting and so on. But the system must also be open to direct intervention from the owner of the home. In today’s homes, you are afraid of touching the thermostat because it’s not clear how the system will react to your direct input. An ideal system can balance automated heuristics with direct ad-hoc input from the owner.

The most important lesson learned from MySQL?

There are so many! Perhaps the most important lesson universally is that there are always many more lessons to learn. We must never think that we are done and ready.

At MySQL we perfected a model for the global distributed workforce. We also learned to thrive in a vast ecosystem where many resources resided outside our own company and outside our control. We learned how to be a disruptive technology vendor.

And very concretely, we learned that some people are ready to spend any amount of time in order to save money. Others are ready to spend money in order to save time. That’s the key to a successful open source business model.

You have a vision of tomorrow’s technological landscape. What gives you confidence for the future?

I learned from a wise man that you can be confident without being certain. We don’t need to see or understand every aspect of the future. In fact, we cannot. But we can be confident that we are moving towards the future with good intentions and high integrity.

And so I know that great technological innovations will be made that enable new services or reduce current inefficiencies. As the world gets more connected, we are sharing more information than before. There is more transparency, and decision-making power is more evenly distributed.