InfoWorld and the new IT

This week’s InfoWorld, with its new magazine format, reflects some of the profound changes that have taken place in IT during the past few years.

It was only four or five years ago that many people in this industry felt they were either constantly running from something (the Y2K threat, for example) or constantly chasing after something (e-commerce), often mainly because everyone else was, too.

In that frenzied environment, you could afford to make technological mistakes. If the system you deployed turned out to have unexpected costs, no problem. Your career was safe — no one gets fired for chasing the corporate Joneses. And with profits constantly improving, your company could spend its way out of trouble.

Today, that strategy sounds as dated as a skyrocketing dot-com IPO.

The challenges now are much harder. Making the right buying decision remains as important to business success as ever. But when you evaluate new technology, you now must answer at least three critical questions. First, you have to judge which competing player can really deliver on its promise. Next, you must figure out which choice will work with your existing equipment — get that one wrong, and the price tag could double or triple.

Finally, you must decide if the choice you make today will still look smart three to five years down the road. That’s an eternity in IT. And because no one can know the future, it poses a problem with no good solution aside from knowledge, research, and pure gut instinct.

For 25 years, InfoWorld’s mission has been to help you make those hard technology choices — and get them right. With this issue, the publication takes on a modestly different “skin” that reinforces that mission.

The new Tech Watch section pulls together the latest on products, services, and technologies, covering the story behind the story to keep you abreast of what you need to know. The Test Center section is where our analysts put products to the test in real-world environments. The feature pages — starting with this week’s cover story on 10Gig switches — dig deep into subjects that deserve expanded coverage. And columnists Ephraim Schwartz, Jon Udell, and Tom Yager look ahead to help you anticipate how IT will change so that today’s decisions hold up tomorrow.

In short, InfoWorld remains dedicated to helping you get technology right — which also happens to be our new tagline. Everyone at InfoWorld takes this mission very seriously, as we know you do. And we trust this publication will continue to make your job easier.