Ten Stories That Rocked (OK, Touched) Your World

IDG News Service - After a three-year roller-coaster ride, the IT industry settled down a bit in 2003. The year seemed to provide a respite from history-making corporate scandals, monopoly-busting, and the exhilarating but scary boom-and-bust cycle.
Not that anyone was operating on cruise control, as this roundup makes clear. Here are the top 10 IT stories of the year, not necessarily in order of importance:

• Offshore Outsourcing: One Worker's Gain Is Another's Loss
  Stories about U.S. companies outsourcing work to India have been reported for years. But this year it became apparent that Romania, Bulgaria, Russia, China, Ghana, the Philippines and dozens of other countries are also clamoring for, and getting, business from the U.S. The value of IT services provided to U.S. businesses from offshore labor will double to $16 billion next year and then almost triple to $46 billion by 2007, according to market research firm IDC. Forecasts such as this sparked fears that Western IT workers would face increasing competition and prompted politicians and trade unions to raise the specter of protectionism. QuickLink a2290



• Oracle, PeopleSoft and J.D. Edwards Star in Merger Drama of the Year
  Legal battles also added to the drama of PeopleSoft Inc.'s acquisition of rival ERP software maker J.D. Edwards & Co. and its subsequent fight to ward off a hostile $5.1 billion takeover bid from Oracle Corp. Oracle, acting as spoiler of the J.D. Edwards deal, got hit with several lawsuits by its takeover target. The fracas is a milestone: The fragmented ERP market has been due for a shakeout, and the Oracle/PeopleSoft bout may end up being just one of many battles, as a series of mergers leads to a new chapter in a business applications story in which there are far fewer characters. QuickLink a3320



• On-Demand Computing Message Besieges Users
  You can call it "utility computing," or you can call it "adaptive computing," or you can call it "autonomic computing," or you can call it "mind-numbing vendorspeak." But whatever you call it, the on-demand computing message bombarded users relentlessly. IBM, Hewlett-Packard Co., Sun Microsystems Inc., Computer Associates International Inc. and Microsoft Corp. led the assault, attempting to gain mind share from IT professionals who are eager to boost efficiency and lower costs in their data centers. But users and analysts agree that a computing infrastructure that adapts to business needs is a long-term vision that will materialize only incrementally over the next decade or so. QuickLink 40444



• Spam Grows From Annoyance to Major Political Issue
  This year, spam was a cause celebre for politicians in Europe and the U.S. In October, an opt-in directive came into effect for the 15 European Union member states. In the last few weeks of the year, the U.S. Congress followed suit by sending an opt-out antispam bill to President George W. Bush to sign. Squabbles over differences in approach gave way to agreement that unless some sort of an antispam crackdown also occurs in Asia, purveyors of unsolicited e-mail will find a haven there. QuickLink a3300


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