When IBM announced it was buying The Weather Company this week, not everyone took the deal seriously. After all, the legacy computer company nicknamed Big Blue has long been pursuing the cloud in the technological sense of the word, beefing up its data analytics business. Was it possible IBM (IBM) mixed up the type of cloud it desired, and instead bought a group of experts in cumulus, fog, and rain-producing varieties?
The jokes pretty much wrote themselves—though that didn’t stop Twitter (TWTR) users from attempting many of their own online (see below). IBM is actually buying The Weather Company’s digital assets, including weather.com, which run on advanced cloud-based technology (on earthbound servers somewhere, not in the sky) to enhance its growing Watson big data services. The acquisition does not actually include The Weather Channel, the meteorological company’s TV arm, as some people tweeted erroneously in their jokes. (Were IBM or TWC in on the joke? Neither responded to a request for comment.) Read on for a selection of cloud-computing comedy:
