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The Weekly Round-Up: 22.07.05
"What if I told you I can name everybody in the Ravenclaw quidditch team?"

By silicon.com

Published: Friday 22 July 2005

"You don't have to go to Hogwarts to learn magic."

It seems even Microsoft is willing to ride the latest wave of Harry Potter-mania, with Kevin Schofield, an exec within the software giant, claiming that learning to be a techie can be just as exciting as learning how to cast spells in a fictional world of witches and wizards.

It's a compelling, if entirely nonsensical argument.

His quote was referring to the many computing courses which are currently undersubscribed... and absolutely nothing like 'care of magical creatures' or 'divination'.

This is the latest attempt to lure people into technology and 'sex it up' a bit (though we're not sure Harry Potter and 'sex' should ever appear in the same sentence ever, ever again... especially as he's now at that difficult age).

Apparently Microsoft fears IT has left itself high and dry by not positioning itself as 'hip and exciting'. Microsoft boss, Bill Gates, for one - a man inextricably linked with 'hip' and 'exciting' - would also like to see more lovely ladies involved in IT as, more than anything, that would suggest the sector has shaken off its geeky boys club image.

However, the Microsoft boss admitted: "I don't know the magic answer."

Though the IT crowd does seem to suspect magic is involved in there somewhere, because they're all name dropping Harry Potter like it's going out of fashion.

And that just oozes 'hip'.

"Hi, would you like a job in IT?"
"No, not really..."
"What if I told you I can name everybody in the Ravenclaw quidditch team?"
"Then I would assume you still live at home with your mother."

Of course realistically they are trying to get them young (which sounds more sinister than it is meant to) and are clearly trying to appeal to the pre-teen school-goers as many of the current generation of Uni students have already been lost to the IT sector, particularly among the fairer sex.

And it becomes easy to see why.

One silicon.com reader wondered why anybody would want more women in IT when those already working in tech aren't too easy on the eye (in his opinion... NOT silicon.com's, so don't flame us, unless you really want to, in which case we can take it).

"Have you had a good look at the girls already in IT? There are all very nice but nothing to write home about," said Simon Cox as he raised his match to the blue touch paper.

Putting the shoe on the other foot, one female reader even wrote in to point out that the male 'totty' isn't actually 'all that' either. (She even suggested old 'Studley Dudley' himself, Bill Gates, is hardly the poster-child for server room sex appeal.... has she not seen these pics of Gates in his youthful prime? What's she talking about?)

Other readers meanwhile tackled more serious issues and suggested condescending attitudes, lack of equality and an inherent sexism within the IT sector might be to blame.

They could be onto something there.

'So come on girls, put on something pretty and go get yourselves a nice little job in IT...' is what somebody guilty of those above traits might say, and the Round-Up condemns such attitudes whole-heartedly and without question.

One woman working on the periphery of the tech sector certainly wasn't impressing anybody this week.

We received a pitch from a woman working for a US PR company, looking for some coverage for one of her clients, though her email may as well have been subtitled 'How not to endear yourself to a silicon.com columnist'.

In an email to columnist and well-known Quocirca analyst Clive Longbottom, she began:

"Hello Mr Longbottom (this is an alias, right?)."

Superb. Well done.

That's the respect out the way... now on with the pitch...

Granted a number of old English names might be lost on some of our friends across the pond but what a stunning way to ensure you don't have the recipient of the email on-side before making your pitch.

It's the equivalent of slapping somebody in the face as they walk into your shop and then asking them whether you might interest them in buying some of your wares.

Unaware that she may already have lost this one, she continued, making a number of claims about her client's offering before concluding "...we have customers and analysts who can back up this claim as well, so know it's not just the opinion of a humble PR pro..."

No, it's just the opinion of a fairly clueless - or at best tactless - PR pro.

We assume counted among said analysts is nobody from Quocirca.

Moving on, the Round-Up explained a fortnight ago that the reaction to terrorist incidents in London is going to be a defiant 'business as usual'. That stands, especially given that news coming through of several explosions in London yesterday sounds far more low key. Only to say, it's interesting to see the mobile operators haven't let experience temper their service provision.

Networks again vanished within seconds of the first news of explosions in the capital - especially unfortunate given the immediate appeal by the Metropolitan police for any camera phone users who captured the incidents to send their pictures by MMS to the police force's website.

While the operators' lack of network coverage may have rendered some of us silent for a while, they might actually do well to encourage a little more 'hush' among their staff while they are out and about.

A couple of silicon.com staffers recently found themselves (like it happened by accident) in a corporate box at the cricket enjoying the cut and thrust of England v Australia while a rather loud individual from a major UK mobile phone operator delighted in telling somebody next to him - and anybody else within earshot, which was most of the ground - how the company revels in making money from adult content and how "prostitution" is their favourite revenue stream, especially those moneys driven by calling cards in phone boxes.

Interesting stuff - and spoken at such a volume that nobody was left out. Even Darren Gough, fielding at third man out on the pitch, was doubtless in the know.

Worse still, this shouty man must have known there were press about - including journalists from a number of nationals as well as the two from silicon.com. He had after all sat at lunch with them.

But this didn't stop him.

"Do we want to be left on the sidelines with only our principles for company?" he asked of his companion, failing to betray the fact he already knew the answer to this rhetorical question (which was - 'of course not, we love smut').

Of course any operator would be lying if they said they don't make a lot of money from the seedier side of data but there are doubtless some who don't shout it from the rafters either.

He also then let the cat out of the bag regarding under-wraps plans to launch a mobile gambling service for handheld sports betting. When one silicon.com staffer quizzed the betting company involved in this co-branded venture, the response was one of mild surprise.

"Oh, he told you about that?" asked the slightly taken aback bookie. "He told EVERYBODY about that," came the reply.

At that point, those with a keen eye may have noticed Goughie nodding in agreement.

Still on the subject of cricket, silicon.com has gained the ear of England cricket captain Michael Vaughan.

We already have an interview up on the site and now in a continuation of a slightly tenuous business angle, he has agreed to answer questions from silicon.com readers about anything from effective team building and man-management (squint and you can just about see that business angle) to sporting questions such as which player he admires most or who in the England squad has the best car or sponsorship deal.

You can email Vaughan questions which he will receive directly on his BlackBerry. He's agreed to answer just twelve questions, so get typing. The email address is: englandteam@vodafone.eu.blackberry.com.

As the Round-Up writes this, the two teams at Lords are trying to out-incompetence one another. Australia did a terrible job with the bat, and England are now returning the favour in some style, so we can't vouch for his mood. But do send him your questions.

Definitely reaching the pinnacle of sporting achievement this past week was the silicon.com team which took part in the 3 Peaks Challenge. You'll all be pleased to hear we not only shattered the 24-hour mark for this gruelling challenge (with 41 minutes to spare) but we all returned safe and in one piece and raised much more than our £5,000 target for CARE International.

We documented the whole trip and we've pictures from all three summits - Ben Nevis, Scafell Pike and Snowdon - just to prove we really did do it (see the pics here).

In total 14 teams completed the challenge within the 24 hours, with Reed Managed Services claiming first place.

Other awards picked up included the prize for the team who collected the most money, which went to Experian for raising £8,000.

A team from Mellon (the bank, rather than a badly spelled fruit) were also rewarded for collecting a sack full of litter from the top of Ben Nevis which was above and beyond the call of duty.

Team Silicon certainly gave it a go, holding onto second place right up until the summit of Snowdon where some minor injuries took their toll.

We also enjoyed a friendly rivalry with the team from event sponsors Vanco, catching and overtaking them on Ben Nevis on our way to an impressive time of 4:05 for that mountain.

However, they enjoyed the last laugh, finishing just ahead of us in a fantastic time of 23:06 - and didn't they let us know.

Vanco's team leader Michael Piddock said: "When Team Silicon jogged past us halfway down Ben Nevis there were some concerns in the squad. However, this just seemed to make us stronger. We reapplied our warpaint, donned our team Aviators, and turned up The Prodigy in the Vanco minibus to take the bragging rights over silicon for 2005."

(He's not joking either - they really did wear warpaint.)

And finally, caricaturists and portrait artists in London's Leicester Square have received a high tech boost from Microsoft this week with the introduction of tablet PCs to replace their pads and pastels.

The idea is simple. The artist draws straight onto the screen of the tablet PC using a stylus and when finished the pic can be emailed via a wireless connection to anywhere in the world.

The benefits are manifold:

1) Tourists won't have to carry around their portrait all week, guarding it like the Dead Sea Scrolls for fear of it getting damaged. (Unless they realise it was a really bad idea and will most likely just gather dust in a drawer, so they bin it almost immediately.)

2) The artists will no longer have to carry around the various tools of their trade - easel, pad, pens, pastels - when a tablet and stylus will do.

3) The tourists can share the experience of a real-life London caricaturist in real time with their loved ones back home.

4) The gangs of hooded robbers prowling Leicester Square will now be able to steal tablet PCs, which doubtless have a far higher resale value down Tottenham Court Road than a handful of Crayola crayons.

We were so intrigued we pressured one member of staff into going down there and putting himself through the ordeal of posing in public while he had his portrait drawn. It was then emailed back to the office for our amusement.

You can see the whole thing unfold here in a photo story:

One analyst who saw the photo story was rather cruelly inclined to comment on one of the features which enjoyed the treatment of exaggeration.

"Steve Ranger's chin: A Star Is Born," wrote Red Monk's James Governor - on his blog, no less. The cheek!

He also noted the possible business implications of this for Microsoft's march towards the paperless office.

"If Bill G is competing with paper, this is a telling win," wrote Governor, clearly sensing that the street artist fraternity is an important demographic for any convicted monopolist intent on further world domination.

Until next week, take care out there and here's some news for you below...