Silicon.com: Making sense of IT, one year on

Exactly 12 months ago today, Silicon.com went live. Since then, companies have merged and expanded faster than Intel can upgrade its chips, the Internet has grown (as predicted by Datamonitor, IDC and any other research company blessed with a crystal ball) and to be in fashion at the end of 1999, it seems you have to be a free ISP.

Through all this, Silicon.com has been there to track the key developments in IT, and to interview industry senior figures from Europe and the US as well as politicians and business leaders in an attempt to work out what it all means for the end user.

Along with this 'normal' coverage, Silicon.com has run two campaigns in an attempt to change attitudes in the industry, and to alter legislation affecting European businesses.

Silicon's first campaign, IT on Board, provoked a fierce debate over the role of the IT director and his or her standing in organisations. The aim was to raise the profile of IT within business - and to foster a greater understanding between business and IT leaders with the ultimate goal of getting IT a seat at board level in many more European companies.

A series of articles (including a 5,000-word white paper), video interviews and a half-day conference in London all played their part in putting this issue at the top of the agenda.

Speaking to the 100-strong audience at the IT on Board conference in February, Rene Carayol, IT director at IPC, urged all those working in end user organisations to be proud of their jobs. "If we're really proud of what we do and what we can achieve, then let's talk it up. Let's not be shy about it... If we can get IT and the business working in unison, then we've cracked it." (http://www.silicon.com/a29041 ).

Professor Chris Edwards of the Cranfield School of Management also spoke at the event, and stressed that different companies have different needs. "Your business should begin to understand how it uses information, to work out whether or not it needs an IT director. You need a combination of technical and non-technical backgrounds, but we haven't found these people yet."

As always, our viewers were ready to give us their opinions. One attendee said a "champion" is needed on companies' boards to breach the gap between the technical and business requirements.

Another said: "As BSkyB becomes a retailer and Tesco becomes a publisher, I think the IT director should have experience with content."

But the most positive message of the day came courtesy of David Taylor, president of IT directors' association, Certus, and now one of Silicon.com's columnists: "We need to change the image of IT forever in this country - so go out there and make a difference."

Silicon's second campaign had a specific target in mind: a badly drafted piece of EC legislation. Our 'Ban the Ban' initiative called on MEPs to rewrite a bill that would have banned Web caching. Article 5.1 of the proposed directive caused an outcry once we'd highlighted the implications. Web caching was cited as a form of copyright infringement and would have been outlawed - thereby slowing the Web down and hindering the nascent European ecommerce market.

Unbeknown to the MEPs, this directive - other than being damaging to European economies - would have been extremely difficult, if not impossible, to implement, highlighting the lack of IT understanding in political circles, and demonstrating the dangers of drafting law with no input from end users.

Silicon won the support of MEP Graham Watson (http://www.silicon.com/a29130 ), Certus' David Taylor, Conservative MP, Michael Fabricant and former Education Minister, Kim Howells (http://www.silicon.com/a23864 ).

The UK government entered the debate after Fabricant tabled a question in the House of Commons on behalf of Silicon.com. Fabricant asked Trade Secretary, Stephen Byers to "make a statement on the likely effects on information technology in the United Kingdom, following the decision by the European Parliament to outlaw Web caching; and the steps he will take to mitigate the effect on British commerce and other Internet users".

The UK government's response provoked further outrage. DTI minister, Michael Wills claimed that as the UK's 1988 Copyright Act already prohibits the unauthorised reproduction of copyright material online, the European directive would not affect UK businesses - in other words, caching was already illegal.

Fabricant slammed the minister, claiming civil servants did not understand the issues, an accusation backed by many industry figures who told Silicon.com that the whole debate was marred by the complete lack of governmental understanding of the technical impact of Article 5.1.

Even one European Parliament PR representative agreed: he told one of our reporters that she would be hard pressed to find any MEP that understood technology.

But we persisted in our campaign to Ban the Ban, and in May, European Commissioner, Mario Monti redrafted the directive to exclude Article 5.1.

Since its launch a year ago, Silicon.com has striven to make a difference in the world of IT, both in the way news is delivered and by trying to raise awareness of crucial issues. Over the next 12 months, we aim to keep those goals clearly in view; judging by the responses of our viewers over the past year, we've made a good start.