Thanks. The reason I was thinking about alternatives to the cloud is because I was peripherally involved with a document management product for laywers/law firms that would make all their documents from all their files available to them where ever needed. Lawyers are desperate for good systems that do this. They have tons (sometimes almost literally) of documents that they may need at a moment's notice: in a hearing, at a deposition, stuck in traffic driving back from court but negotiating on the phone, etc. So they are very receptive to a system that can make this happen.
However, they are just not comfortable with the idea of their documents existing in the cloud. It just freaks them out. This is understandable because the stakes for them can be very, very high.
You mention creative people and I know lawyers don't trust the cloud. I know the company I currently work for would never trust Google docs or any external entity to host our information. I guess it might be that no one with important data is comfortable with it being stored in the cloud. At least not today.
My personal guess is that the cloud will prove itself over time and that people and companies will come to understand and be comfortable with its risks. But I think this will take time and there will doubtless be painful lessons to learn along the way.
People and companies trust other companies with their money so it stands to reason that they could trust one with their information as well. We trust banks with our money, though, because they are regulated, audited, insured and have reputations to protect. Standards of practice have been developing over decades (well, centuries, really).
It may be a long time before "information banks" can achieve this level of trust.
