At this change of year and change of decade, we’ve been providing some historical context. Now it’s time to look forward toward the next decade and venture forth with some prognostication – or at least reasonable guesses, as to some of the major trends we’re already seeing and that we expect to become major factors.
Also read: The decade in review – and the decade ahead
The first of these trends is “true” convergence. By this, we mean not only the convergence of all types of communications media (voice, video, “data,” messaging) but also the merger of communications and “IT” so that there no longer exists a difference between the network and application.
All of the current development of “Cloud Networking” has been discussed extensively. And while we have discussed the piece parts – of which there are many and they all deserve discussion – we see this move back “into the network” to be a long term trend that will not swing back.
There are many reasons that we have historically performed IT function in the data center and on the desktop. But the most important underlying reasons are simple: It was the most cost-effective method and cloud-based computing was not available – at least in the decades since PCs overtook “time sharing” as the norm for computing.
So why won’t we go back? It’s simple. Mobility.
A premise-based computing paradigm requires that the data reside in the data center and/or on a PC. As a trivial example, we’ve all gone through years of synchronizing e-mail between our PCs and our laptops/notebooks when we travel. We’ve had to make sure that we had our most important files with us. And a point that Jim and Steve have commiserated about numerous times over the years is that the price of a new PC is inconsequential when compared with the time-cost of loading and synchronizing applications.
Even on our small scale, we’ve recently made moves to service-based models such as using Salesforce.com and Gmail. And, in fact, Steve’s move to Gmail was not made because of cost or maintenance of servers. Rather, it was so the same consistent interface – and all of the data – was available both in the office and on his Droid. (This is not without its drawbacks, as Steve has been known to read and respond to e-mail while out doing “geriatric jogging” around the neighborhood.)
But the story is there. As we look toward the combination of great toys and business necessities (if we can tell the difference), having platform-independent IT is simply mandated. We will all demand that the same interface and capabilities are present on a “PC,” a smartphone, a tablet, an Internet-enabled television, or whatever the next cool device happens to be.
So is this the end of high-end PCs? Absolutely not. There’s still one use for them that will continue to require more horsepower. Games.
