In one sense, cloud computing could end up being the best thing to happen to SOA governance. That's because the existence of cloud computing makes governance all the more critical.

In theory, clouds can deliver almost every IT capability -- from applications down to middleware, application platforms, and even storage, processing and other hardware resources -- as on-demand subscription offerings.

But how does an IT executive provide sound management in a cloud computing world?

"The cloud revitalizes interest in governance because you are extending trust to services across premise and presumably corporate boundaries," says Miko Matsumura, vice president and deputy CTO at Software AG. "Not only is that significant from a governance perspective, but the complexity of mashing up cloud services with on premise applications, integrations and infrastructure requires a framework for maintaining overall integrity."

In other words, clouds complicate the SOA governance picture. Without proper governance, anyone could deploy a new cloud service any time they wish, and anyone could invoke and orchestrate that service into ever more convoluted messaging patterns.