Pro- or convergence?

Convergence means many things to different people. Is IT headed toward a Nirvana where IT staff never have to configure another desktop or printer? Will digital identity provide a foundation for companies to securely manage their intellectual property? Or is this all a bunch of hooey that marketing and public relations people spew forth to keep their jobs? Test Center Technical Director Tom Yager and Senior Analyst P.J. Connolly share their thoughts on the convergence phenomenon.

P.J: Okay, let’s make sure we’re clear on some things. I’m not completely cynical. Show me some gee-whiz technology that has the potential to save money and make the lives of IT workers easier, and I can be impressed. But I’ve never been into technology for technology’s sake. I treat a lot of demos like I would a concept car at an auto show: It may look nifty, but do you really want to be driving that thing in the middle of the night on an icy two-lane highway?

Let’s face it: Practical is in. Convergence isn’t showing much benefit from where I sit, but rather is an excuse for throwing money at unproven technologies. Oh sure, there might be some interesting things in there, but for the most part, convergence is crap.

Tom: I’m about as old school as you’ll find in IT. I look at Excel and think how little progress we’ve made from the green screen. But then I see Apple’s Keynote presentation software and Nokia’s 3650 integrated phone (see “More than a cell phone”). I see Wi-Fi not as a networking solution, but as a social one. Technology used to be a rope binding us to our desks and to narrowly defined job descriptions. Convergence helps add spontaneity, creativity, humor, and emotion to our dull work of moving data from one place to another. Convergence reasserts the importance of the true endpoints of all computer-assisted communications: people.

Management can find plenty of practical, bottom-line benefits to convergence. It’s an effective vehicle for the promotion of public standards. Pervasive convergence makes integration unnecessary; everything is expected to interact openly with everything else. Convergence extends the value of infrastructure, too. Cellular carriers will finally make money again by delivering data packets, and businesses will lower building and maintenance costs by converging voice and data circuits.

P.J.: Oh geez, not the blending of voice and data again. I’ve been listening to that nonsense for almost as long as I’ve been writing about technology, and I still don’t see how it’s going to radically alter the way most companies use the telephone network in less than a decade. Granted, when I was first hearing about the voice-over-IP revolution, it was five years ago, and then I said it would take 20 years. But it’s still a niche application, and it’s going to stay one until all of those PBXes in the phone closets of corporations are depreciated and maybe not until spare parts become unavailable at any price.

The problem with most converged solutions is that they usually require people to deal with a whole new layer of abstraction. That takes time to adjust to, time that’s taken away from the rest of one’s work — the real job one holds.

Tom: I’m so glad I don’t work for a boss who uses the phrase “real job.” Abstraction is beneficial. Geeks like us enjoy mucking around in the plumbing. I still get annoyed when a product won’t let me pull up the blinds, and watch the ones and zeroes whiz by. But that’s not practical. It defines my use of technology in technological, not human terms.

Rendezvous (Apple’s implementation of zero-config networking) defies everything I know about how networking should be done. I can open two unconfigured PowerBooks in the same room and, a few seconds later, use iChat (and other iLife applications) between them. No IP subnet calculations, no name servers, no routing hassles. Just communication, person to person.

It should always be that easy, and it should work the same whether you’re using Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, cellular data, Ethernet, or null modem cables. There’s one major barrier: identity. Other technology, from our cable boxes to our cell phones and cars, carries a unique ID and can be traced to us. As long as we insist that our computers are anonymous, we withhold from them the right to communicate on our behalf.

P.J: I agree that network configuration hassles are more frustrating than rush-hour traffic, but you might want to read some of the draft standards before you claim they’ll be a panacea. Zero-config networking isn’t going to do away with the need for people who know how to configure routers and switches, since at present it has some limitations that make it impractical for larger networks.

Granted, the way companies keep laying off workers, that limit may not be a problem in a couple of years, since “Global 1000” status will soon mean that you can afford to have 1,000 employees outside of the Third World.

I’m wary anytime I hear someone talking about digital rights management because that’s usually a euphemism for “doing away with fair use.” After all, the surest way to chase off your customers is to treat them like criminals. I keep having problems with the concept of digital ID, as well. That’s because I always want to know who’s watching the watchers. There are other hurdles that digital IDs have to surmount. Making identity a “digital” construct makes it that much easier to manipulate and impersonate others. Yes, I’m a cynic. Who wouldn’t be, after looking at the so-called benefits of convergence?

Tom: Identity has been a digital construct since before the invention of the computer. What do you think your Social Security Number is for? By arbitrarily staking out our PCs as havens of anonymity, we keep them from being as useful to us as old-fashioned, authenticated human interaction. I recognize your voice and your face. If our computers are in the same room, why shouldn’t mine recognize yours? Look at all a cell phone can do now, and consider how much of that depends on identity and trust. Computers can’t emulate and add to the richness of human communication until we let them build relationships. That’s the cornerstone of convergence and the future of information technology.