EMC's video sniping at Oracle makes both companies look silly -- and neither actually delivers on the cloud promise On behalf of its Greenplum Data Computing Appliance “cloud in a box,” EMC has been taking some cheap shots at Oracle’s Exadata, with a YouTube video that shows an actor who looks a lot like Larry Ellison with a gift box attached to his fly. The topic is “cloud in a box,” and this is a single video in EMC’s Greenplum series, all focusing on Oracle. Don’t get me wrong: I’m all for having technology company take innovative approaches to marketing, such as stealing premises from Apple and hiring actors that look like billionaire software executives and attaching props to their crotch. However, EMC cloud is missing the core message and, thus, any potential customers it is trying to reach.[ Get the no-nonsense explanations and advice you need to take real advantage of cloud computing in InfoWorld editors’ 21-page Cloud Computing Deep Dive PDF special report. | Stay up on the cloud with InfoWorld’s Cloud Computing Report newsletter. ] The truth is that both EMC and Oracle have done little to promote the value of cloud computing. Instead, they’re selling very expensive software and hardware that may not bring the promise of cloud computing any closer to the enterprise. Although cloud computing can provide remotely accessible services that enterprises can use to make critical systems — such as data warehousing — much more affordable and efficient, that’s not what EMC and Oracle are offering. Instead, they are trying to sell you more hardware and software for your data center. Why? Because they make money by selling hardware and software, not by selling cloud computing services.The core message is one of confusion. Cloud computing is about using IT assets in much more efficient and effective ways, and not about layering another couple of million dollars in hardware and software technology in the existing data center just because somebody has associated the “cloud” label with it. There is no “cloud in a box” — there are no shortcuts to cloud computing. No matter how many clever marketing videos you make, nothing will change that.This article, “The YouTube food fight over the nonexistent ‘cloud in a box,’” originally appeared at InfoWorld.com. Read more of David Linthicum’s Cloud Computing blog and track the latest developments in cloud computing at InfoWorld.com. For the latest in business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter. Cloud ComputingTechnology Industry