A few things in IT remain true, despite the best efforts of vendor marketers, management gurus, industry analysts and Computerworld pundits to make everyone believe otherwise:
• The Internet poses security risks. Always has. Always will.
• Users don't understand IT - never have, never will. All they really understand is their jobs.
• No project gets enough time, budget and resources to be done the way it should be done.
• "Free" anything isn't.
• Faster hardware is cheaper than faster software.
• Vendors and consultants are trying to make as much money from customers as possible. It's up to us to get our money's worth. Caveat emptor.
• The best technology doesn't always make a successful product. Then again, the best technology may not be what you need.
• Some vendors really don't like some other vendors - so much that they're willing to let it get in the way of working with customers.
• If nobody else is trying something, there's usually a reason. Maybe not a good reason, but a reason.
• Faster hardware doesn't solve business problems - unless the business problem is slow hardware.
• The CEO will always think consultants' ideas are good because he's paying good money for them.
• Traffic expands to fill the bandwidth provided.
• If you take something away from users, they'll sneak it in the back way anyhow.
• The most powerful influence on CEOs' IT preferences are the people who write for airline in-flight magazines.
• "More bandwidth/memory/storage/processing power than you'll ever need" will last you six months. A year, tops.
• "We've never done it that way before" is a more powerful argument than any cost/benefit analysis.
• IT projects advance or die. Sometimes both. But if it isn't advancing, it's dying.
• Nobody ever got fired for buying the flavor of the month.
• What counts isn't how much a product costs when you buy it. What counts is how much it costs before you finally shut it down.
• Functionality isn't the same as usefulness.
• When you just have a hammer, everything looks like a nail. Most IT people just have technology.
• It always takes longer and costs more to fix it later.
• The systems that last are the ones you were counting on to be obsolete.
• A good idea is no match for a bad habit.
• By the time your CEO has read about a technology, it's no longer a strategic advantage.
• Ninety percent of a system's cost is still training people to use it.
• IT projects fail. Large projects fail more often than small ones. So if failure isn't an option, you'll never do anything.
• If you think your company's users are awful, just wait till you're on the Web and have customers of your own.
• Exactly what you want always costs more than what you can afford - whether it's technology or IT employees.
• Old ideas got that way because they proved useful.
• Data isn't information. Information isn't knowledge. Knowledge isn't manageable.
• Systems aren't made from metaphors, paradigms and methodologies. They're made from code, wires and hardware.
• The Model T didn't become a standard because it was the best. It became a standard because it was the cheapest.
• The hardest problems get solved last.
Hayes, Computerworld's senior news columnist, has covered IT for more than 20 years. His e-mail address is frank_hayes@computerworld.com.