How dodgy kit helped bust the recession

One swallow does not make a fat lunch, and one survey doesn't mean the recession is over. But it could be we're finally through the worst.

One release to pass over our news desk, from a think-tank called the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), says forthcoming survey results will show the first quarter of 2002 (which isn't over yet) will be slightly better than last year's.

Don't crack open the champagne yet. It will be a while before the horror is fully over. But it's good to hear that the cobwebs are being blown off the chequebooks at last.

Soon, we hope, the smiles should start to return to the faces of high-tech finance directors, and the P45s will cease to flow. With luck, people will stop looking at technology workers as if they had some horrible disease.

All this is partly down to the fact that most IT kit is effectively useless after two or three years. This is usually a source of extreme frustration for IT managers and anyone who's ever shelled out a grand for a PC.

But, according to the CEBR, that's why this private IT-only recession is so short. Because however tight the budgets are, people have to buy new IT kit because the old stuff is pretty much useless. Especially considering how many upgrades were carried out in 1999, for Y2K reasons.

That's the joy of built-in obsolescence. So next time someone tries to sell you 'future-proof' kit, say no. The industry is depending on you.