justified, comparing it to the "long, ugly war over WS-I". The call for open cloud standards was later echoed by Brandon Watson, Microsoft's Director of Cloud Services Ecosystem. Principles The following principles are defined by the document: User centric systems enrich the lives of individuals, education, communication, collaboration, business, entertainment and society as a whole; the end user is the primary stakeholder in cloud computing. Philanthropic initiatives can greatly increase the well-being of mankind; they should be enabled or enhanced by cloud computing where possible. Openness of standards, systems and software empowers and protects users; existing standards should be adopted where possible for the benefit of all stakeholders. Transparency fosters trust and accountability; decisions should be open to public collaboration and scrutiny and never be made "behind closed doors". Interoperability ensures effectiveness of cloud computing as a public resource; systems must be interoperable over a minimal set of community defined standards and vendor lock-in must be avoided. Representation of all stakeholders is essential; interoperability and standards efforts should not be dominated by vendor(s). Discrimination against any party for any reason is unacceptable; barriers to entry must be minimised. Evolution is an ongoing process in an immature market; standards may take some time to develop and coalesce but activities should be coordinated and collaborative. Balance of commercial and consumer interests is paramount; if in doubt consumer interests prevail. Security is fundamental, not optional. See also Cloud computing List of Web service specifications References External links Cloud Computing Manifesto in the Cloud Computing Community wiki Open Cloud Manifesto leaked document A Manifesto for Future Generation Cloud Computing: Research Directions for the Next Decade Cloud computing