New Release: State of the Nonprofit Cloud

This week, our friends at NTEN (the Nonprofit Technology Network) released a new report researched and written by Idealware, The State of the Nonprofit Cloud: The Results of a Study of Nonprofit Use of Cloud Software. Here's a little bit about what you'll find in its pages:

"In the second half of 2011, when we set out to look at the state of the nonprofit cloud, we weren’t sure what to expect—and what we found after surveying U.S. nonprofits and conducting follow-up interviews was that it’s somewhat... foggy. The vast majority of nonprofits we surveyed were using hosted software, but our interviews with staff members revealed that many didn’t even realize those systems could be considered hosted, or 'cloud,' solutions. In addition, many respondents said they were concerned about security for some hosted systems—especially constituent databases—but were comfortably using other hosted systems for equally sensitive information, such as business email."

The 35-page report includes a data-rich look at perceptions of the cloud and how they differ from reality, and addresses everything from security and Return on Investment to adoption. It also offers a look at cloud usage in the real world through case studies of a number of nonprofits. 

The entire report is free over at NTEN. Download it now.