Forecast Cloudy—Fair or Stormy Weather: Cloud Computing Insights and Issues

To engage theory and practice of cloud computing in business, the third annual Journal of Information Systems Conference (JISC) brought together 29 academic researchers and 14 practitioners. This commentary reviews and synthesizes discussions and insights provided by three keynote presentations and panel discussions. In addition to sharing insights from the conference, this commentary identifies major themes, incorporates relevant current literature, and suggests potential research questions expressed by practitioners. The JISC emphasized the impact of the rapid maturing of cloud computing services on accounting information systems (AIS). Several recurring themes emerged throughout the conference: (1) rapid growth and evolution of cloud managed services, (2) security, privacy, and risk in the cloud ecosystem, (3) impact of cloud computing for data analytics, and (4) emerging and disruptive financial technologies and trends for the cloud. Most of the discussion surrounding these themes predominantly focused on the perspectives of cloud assurance and cloud service providers.