Bernd Erk

All the technical diversity we enjoy in our industry is the result of internal evangelism 20 yers ago. Now all three major cloud providers have been pushing their serverless solutions to lure customers into a new form of vendor lock-in. I think it is time, to remind ourselves about Open Standards.

All the technical freedom and diversity we enjoy in our industry is the result of internal, grass root evangelism. Over the last couple of decades, thought leaders have strongly opposed manufacturer-centric strategies and argued the case of Open Source and Open Standards. This ultimately led to the success of Linux and Open Source we have today. But now, two decades later, the IT industry is in upheaval again: All three major cloud providers have been pushing their serverless solutions in order to lure customers into a new form of vendor lock-in. And they succeeded: The number of serverless deployments has already surpassed those of container based ones. “So this is how liberty dies … with thunderous applause” I think there is no time to waste, to remind ourselves about Open Standards, their value to our industry, and why it is worth to fight for them to survive. Open Standards go beyond the boundaries of development and operation. They are the foundation of a barrier free interoperability and independent communications. The lecture aims to inspire the connection between both worlds and paradigms for a modern and flexible application infrastructure.