As 2009 comes to a close, we thought we would take a look ahead towards 2010 and how technology and in particular “consumer Web trends” are impacting IT.
The following is our view of the top 3 trends and an initial assessment of what it means for IT and managed service providers (MSPs).
Why only three trends you might ask? There are a number of reasons including the fact that we like to try and distill the complicated to its essence (and can you really remember any Top 10 list?), but more importantly, we believe most other technology related trends including: social networking, the explosive growth of user generated content, location-awareness, mobile payments, and increased regulation, stand on the shoulders of these three.
1. The real-time Web
Real-time refers to the immediacy with which we want to interact with others and assess the world around us. Our demand for constant connectedness will move from a tradeoff (do I eat breakfast first or start checking my Twitter feed) to a more integrated way of being and living (my device will analyze and report to me what happened during the night while I eat breakfast). The border between what is physical and immediately in front of us and the virtual world around us will begin to meld over time. The implication for IT will be massive in a number of critical areas. Web connected devices will be the norm and critical applications will need to be omnipresent regardless of where a user is (or device that they are using). Users will expect to seamlessly transition from one device to another and management will require instant visibility into what is happening across the organization and marketplace. There will be an ever increasing flow of data and business intelligence required to digest it.
2. Cloud computing
This is the one that takes the cake for the most hype and general misunderstanding. You could simply say that cloud computing is defined as “applications running on the Internet.” These could be provided by an ISV (e.g. the Paglo IT Management SaaS service) or you could build an online application on your own on a platform like Amazon or Google. With this in mind, as we recently pointed out, just because you offer a hosted application or provide an online service, you are not delivering a cloud computing platform which others can build apps on. Regardless, we wonder when a Web-centric OS like Google Chrome OS will change how we think about the desktop vs. the cloud. When it becomes as easy to pick and chose online applications and share data amongst them (as with desktop) computing today, game over. The cloud will be the computer. IT will need to carefully watch this transformation. And a good canary to monitor will be the launch of Microsoft’s Office Web Apps which is the free online version of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and OneNote. This is scheduled to happen in 2010.
3. Your privacy is an illusion
The self is more transparent than ever. And the secure corporate barrier which formerly protected the “crown jewels” is no more. Blame it on the real-time Web and the human desire to communicate. People and businesses are increasingly inside-out. This trend is thorny because on the one hand it helps create deeper relationships for businesses, but it also opens us up to disclosure leaks and external threats like never before. Saying “No!” will fail, and sitting back and doing nothing will lead to disaster. IT must be part of the ongoing discussion and use both policy and technology where necessary to define and reestablish an acceptable barrier. We especially see the need in small and mid-sized organizations and note that this is one area where consultants can differentiate themselves and truly provide value-added service.
These are the key trends that we think matter. The good news is that by grappling with them IT professionals will further highlight their strategic value.
We are looking forward to an exciting 2010.
