On 20 July 1969, the world watched in awe as Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins made the historical moon landing. This was seen as the crowning achievement of humankind`s sense of adventure and desire to explore.

How can the ICT industry stand idle while tender processes take a wrong turn?

Corruption-buster Fantas Mobu`s departure from Sita left it rather off-balance.

Olivier Fortuin has been appointed HP SA country manager.

We have questions we would like answered... if you dare.

A recent study has found South African companies to be disillusioned when it comes to tackling computer crime.

It`s generally believed that South African businesses need more ICT skills than are currently available. The blame is placed at the global skills shortage and brain drain, affirmative action that has excluded certain skills, and a bad education system that doesn`t promote the pursuit of technical skills. But no one as yet has assed the real extent of this shortage and its impact on local businesses. Does the ICT sector face a skills crisis, or are its practitioners filling the gaps through skills development? What are the most pressing skills needs?

When traditional telco giants ruled the contact centre world, not many companies would run a software-based open-standard communications system on a Windows platform. The next thing we heard, the traditional PBX was dead.

Broadband-wired gated communities in affluent urban areas will spend R1.3 billion by 2012. The industry is banking on the Joneses to shame the Smiths into making it happen.

Cisco South Africa has met its local investment obligations and is aiming to stimulate economic growth in the country.

Building on last year`s `The Consumerisation of IT` theme, Gartner this year selected the `Transformation of Technology` for the Gartner Symposium, held in Cape Town recently.

Whither the modern outsourcing provider? On the one hand, it has to provide some kind of business value for its client. On the other, it also struggles to find the skills that force companies to outsource in the first place. And because technology is so intertwined with modern business, quite often customers don`t want to own a problem but also can`t bear to lose control. It`s a unique set of pressures, as Brainstorm heard during a roundtable discussion held in Johannesburg recently.

For once, government pulls it together and realises the folly of doubling up on cable projects.

When Martin Walshaw is told there`s something he cannot do, he tries to do it anyway.

Competing in the UK health insurance market requires first-class service. A South African support team is not only competing favourably, but outdoing UK opposition.

As with other areas of technology, there is some confusion over the origins of local area networking (LAN) technology. Anyone who has ever worked at Data General might be inclined to believe the very first LAN technology to emerge was ARCNet. Indeed, ARCNet was invented by John Murphy and introduced by Data General in December 1977, while its apparent primary rival, Ethernet, was only unveiled by Xerox Palo Alto Research Centre (PARC) in 1979.

Gartner says understanding the drivers behind ITAM is critical to the success of any initiative.

ITAM is still a no-brainer and local companies still don`t have a handle on it. This could prove to be a very expensive omission.

Risk management is nothing new, but today`s organisation faces unique challenges. Information and the IT systems that support it are deeply embedded in nearly all aspects of business and as a result, the CIO`s mission to support the organisation now means coping with a proliferating - and often rapidly changing - array of threats.

Free! Free at last! VANS celebrate their new ability to self-provide, while the industry high-fives Altech.