Time to overcome this nano-faith in IT
The IT industry will remain in the doldrums until it starts convincing cautious users with observable benefits, writes Guy Matthews.
Positivism: the philosophical system that recognises only non-metaphysical facts and observable phenomena.
The IT industry: put the key of despair into the lock of apathy. Turn the knob of mediocrity and open the gates of despondency.
Utility computing, grid computing and computing on demand are the next big things. Of course. If only we had seen that using the capacity that already exists combined with delivering computing power when it is needed was the key to reviving people's belief in the benefits of IT.
We can, of course, expect all of this to disappear into the ether too. These things have a place but we had better start accepting that the next big thing is of no interest to anyone.
Why? Because years of overselling and under-delivery has made cynics of us all. Everyone is petrified about the next little thing.
Bill Joy, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, is telling anyone that will listen that self-replicating nano-machines are the biggest threat to life on Earth since God left the taps on.
Mr Joy is quoted as saying: "It is no exaggeration to say we are on the cusp of the further perfection of extreme evil."
Apparently the world is going to turn into a lump of grey goo as these machines burst out of their laboratories and start sucking up atoms to make more nano-machines. The lack of irony is, well, ironic.
It really is hard to know what is going on these days. We are well into 2003 and no one knows whether the IT industry is bouncing back or continuing to fall.
Big firms (usually software companies selling enterprise applications designed to streamline business processes such as spend management) continue to restate their earnings with absolutely no sense of irony.
Others blame poor performance on a flu virus that wasn't around three months ago but was somehow affecting people's willingness to invest in IT since before last Christmas.
The palpable sense of relief when the war in Iraq finally started seemed to evaporate as it became apparent that an easy victory was at hand.
Now we all stare at the looming summer months with a sense of resignation that business will remain in the doldrums for a while yet.
All of this points to a growing sense of unease that business lacks direction. And this goes beyond the channel, even beyond the IT industry.
The reality is that, until we start delivering observable benefits, we will continue wading through goo.