Opinions

We wrap up from CeBIT 2010 with a collection of the best tech products and innovations on show.

Data center managers and equipment vendors looking for greener alternatives will begin to benefit this year from a major initiative aimed at reducing the power consumed by Ethernet equipment. IEEE 802.3az, or the Energy-Efficient Ethernet (EEE) standard, will implement low-power idle (LPI) modes for the full range of Ethernet BASE-T transceivers (100Mb, 1GbE and 10GbE) and the backplane physical layer standards (1GbE, 4-lane 1GbE and 10GbE).

Google prides itself on releasing products early and improving on them quickly, but this philosophy sometimes does a disservice to the company and to its users, as illustrated by this week's ballyhooed release of Buzz in Gmail.

No doubt, a leading IT story in 2010 will be the role that sector will play in the expected economic recovery, as well as how IT markets themselves recover. OK, so that's a no-brainer to predict, but we're latching on to some more specific details in that regard, and we've found a limb or three to walk out on as well. In no particular order we present the 2010 edition of our annual predictions.

Looking through the holidays into 2010 there are four clear priorities for risk management that cut across all tiers with financial institutions. Over the last year the pendulum has swung from the exotic to the pragmatic, from chaos to order within financial services. The four priorities for risk in 2010 can be derived from the word D.A.T.A.(data, analysis, transparency, accuracy).

If minister Stephen Conroy really wants to make compulsory ISP filtering a reality, he will have to pull it off without going through parliament as it currently stands.

BlackBerry is rolling out the Bold 9700 which will be available from T-Mobile and AT&T. For T-Mobile and AT&T customers who are Blackberry devotees, this is great news. For the rest of the smartphone market it is more or less not news-- at least not compared with more innovative device that have been introduced lately.

Over the past couple of years, IT managers have been forced to make a lot of tough decisions. Budget cuts, layoffs and project cancellations became commonplace occurrences. But just because we may be seeing the beginning of an economic recovery, that doesn't mean we're at the end of the hard choices.

On September 16, 1003 IT industry people turned up to lunch at the Brisbane Convention Centre to hear the Premier of Queensland, Anna Bligh, give her ‘state of the union’ address. On the previous occasion in 2008, 946 turned up.

One battle ends as another begins

There are a range of interesting, albeit different, stories within this week’s edition of ARN.

One of the consequences of the pressures of 21st century business is that while we all talk a good game about excellence, what we usually get and give out is nothing of the kind. Moreover, the bigger the organization and the more money involved the less achieving excellence there is and the more talking about it that goes on.

Local insight by RAW consulting managing director.

Over the last week I've been on a fact-finding mission to Scandinavia. No sign of the Swedish National Bikini team (yet), but I've run into a few companies that may help determine what our always-connected lives may look like in a few years.