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• Amazon adds in-memory caching to its cloud

  Amazon Web Services (AWS) has launched a public beta test of ElastiCache, which is designed to allow enterprises to speed up their Web applications, the company said on Monday.

• Amazon promises to improve redundancy after Dublin outage

  Amazon Web Services (AWS) learned a lot of lessons from the outage that affected its Dublin data center, and will now work to improve power redundancy, load balancing and the way it communicates when something goes wrong with its cloud, the company said in a summary of the incident.

• Software error complicates Amazon's data center recovery

  Amazon Web Services' efforts to restore service following a power outage at its Dublin data center were complicated further on Monday by an error in the EBS (Elastic Block Storage) software, the company said.

• Lightning strike in Dublin downs Amazon, Microsoft clouds

  A lightening strike in Dublin on Sunday caused a power failure in data centers belonging to Amazon and Microsoft, causing the companies' cloud services to go offline.

• The good, bad & ugly of Dropbox authentication error

  Online storage service Dropbox made an embarrassing error Monday, turning off password authentication for millions of users.

• Researchers: AWS users are leaving security holes

  Researchers in Germany have found abundant security problems within Amazon's cloud-computing services due to its customers either ignoring or forgetting published security tips.

• Four Safer Ways to Pay Online

  Who has your private info? Who knows, given how common <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/229301/are_you_a_data_breach_victim_heres_what_to_do.html">security breaches</a> have become. And credit card information is one of the most common types of <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/article/227255/protect_your_data_from_the_breach_epidemic.html">personal data</a> we volunteer online. So what can you do to minimize credit card fraud? Well, you can't stop the break-ins, but here are four ways to keep your funds out of the hands of the bad guys.

• Facebook facial recognition: New technology, old problem

  Facebook, oh Facebook. Will you ever learn?

• Cloud storage services keep data safe and accessible

  Your PC's hard drive may have half a terabyte of data on its platters, and you might not remember the last time you backed any of it up. In all likelihood, though, you use only a few gigabytes' worth of files on a regular basis. With a combination of cloud-storage services, you can keep that data backed up and synced among all of your computers automatically, and access your most essential files whenever you want.

• Jobs to keynote Apple WWDC, introduce iCloud

  Taking the stage a second time after going on medical leave five months ago, Apple CEO Steve Jobs is slated to announce the iCloud services offering at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) next week.

• Apache focuses on cloud standard

  Recognizing the growing need for vendor-neutral standards in the cloud computing field, the Apache Software Foundation has prioritized development of its Libcloud unified cloud interface as a top-level project, the organization announced Wednesday.

• Moving to the cloud isn't for everyone: What to consider

  Turning to Internet services instead of in-house servers appeals to companies seeking lean, mobile operations. The "cloud" is a hot buzzword, but moving the bulk of your infrastructure and data there isn't right for every business. Most small companies plug along with a mix of on-site and off-site hardware and software. For some organizations, maintaining in-house servers is crucial.

• Does Chromebook hardware-as-a-service make sense?

  Google made an interesting hardware-as-a-service proposition to businesses Wednesday with the introduction of the Chromebook. The Web-centric and laptop-like device will launch next month with support from vendor partners Samsung and Acer.

• How to make your small business paperless: A success story

  When I started teaching viola and violin years ago, I brought all the books my students used along with me, just in case the kids forgot theirs. Then the kids became more advanced, and I had to carry more books. I also sent them each home with a practice chart for the week. The studio grew, and I printed out more and more weekly charts.

• Turn Amazon Cloud drive into desktop-accessible storage

  As you may recall, Amazon recently unveiled its new Cloud Drive service, which provides 5GB of free online storage. (Elsewhere I explained how you could bump your limit to 20GB for under a buck.) The only downside? To access it, you have to use Amazon's Web-based interface. It's not bad, but not nearly as convenient as, say, a local hard drive.