What would you do with your IT budget this year ?

The top tech concepts that will keep you busy this year could be -

• virtualization - over 50% of all the servers in the world are virtualized. This technology is going to step out of the datacenter and move on to SMBs and even your desktop. The idea is to squeeze the last ounce of computing power from your chips.
• information security - intrusion detection, access management, authentication technologies, security audits, firewalls, UTM boxes blah blah .. get yourself and your information lockedup in a 'safe' place .. if you can.
• the green move - I am facinated by this move and I'm quiet excited about working on this I should say. Its not just about being friends with nature but to get your costs down by being more efficient and productive. It will have a great effect on your energy costs and cooling expenses. If you think this is just for datacenteres, you should take a look at this - www.ncomputing.com . I am in love with it already.
• social networking software - orkut, linkedin, myspace, facebook and all that sprouts up on the web ( thanks to Web 2.0) is changing the way we interact with the society. Your enterpise could tap into the power of 'humman connections'.
• enterprise mobility - I am 'always awailable' if you need me for work. Sad, but true thankz to realtime mobility. You cell phones with IMs VoIP softphones etc can work with WiFi hotspots at home, work, coffee shop, canteen etc to keep u hooked on to your work no matter where you go.
• web 2.0 - I wonder if you'd find conventional operating systems go thinner and thinner untill it becomes just a browser which supports web 2.0. Go Fig ..
• web - video collaboration - Polycom, Aethra, Sony which dominated the market finds competition from mlabs, webex and a plethora of opensource applications. MS finally became serious about that NetMeeting application after all these years. And then there are paltalk, skype, meBeam etc.
• software as a service - Well if you want to move your software expenses from CapEX to OppEX, then this is where you should go. But do you really want to move all your data out of your control to someone else who'd process it and get back to you? I suppose you would, cuzz they'd do a better job when it comes to security and uptime than you could.