Lawyers, Power Cuts and The Cloud

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A couple of weeks ago there was a power outage in central Glasgow that affected parts of the G2 and G3 postcodes. This included my law firm’s HQ: The Inksterplex. Power was out for a little over an hour. When it did come back on there was a couple more short outages before it stabilised. Then a week later exactly the same thing happened but this time for the best part of two hours. This was an unusual occurrence in the centre of a city and not one that you would expect to happen twice in the space of a week. However, it did demonstrate the benefits of cloud computing.

We are aware of a #POWERCUT in #G2 #Glasgow. Our engineers are working to restore supplies. Sorry for the inconvenience.

— SP Energy Networks (@SPEnergyNetwork) March 23, 2015

Had our servers been located within The Inksterplex then work that Team Inksters were working on when the power went off may have been lost. If remote workers in our Wick and Portree offices or those working from home or on the move were connected to such servers within The Inksterplex then they would have been cut off too.

As it is that thankfully was not the case. Our servers are not located in The Inksterplex but are located in a data centre which benefits from back up generators in an event of a power cut. Our solicitors in Wick and Portree were able to operate as normal. Those solicitors at home or on the move were unaware of the power cut. I was in Shetland on business during the second power cut and was operating without difficulty via my Surface. Even those in The Inksterplex could still function via their mobile phones or laptops (assuming their batteries were charged!).

So a clear example of the benefits of having your law firm in the cloud.