If the fancy speeches from the ICT council are to be believed, New Zealand’s central and local government technology buyers are after innovation, collaboration and participation reports ComputerWorld.
That’s cool, but it could just be words. We’ve heard that kind of talk before and nothing much happened. On the other hand Christchurch council had to make IT purchasing decisions quickly following the earthquakes – a smart move given the way risk averse managers have been stifling innovation.
Brendan Boyle moves up
Government CIO Brendan Boyle is set to leave his job and pick up a new role as the CEO of the Ministry of Economic Development. Boyle was behind the move to squeezing technology suppliers with the government’s bulk-buying power and put more data online. He also oversaw the integration of the National Library of New Zealand and Archives New Zealand into the Department of Internal Affairs and Land Information New Zealand’s Land online project.
Good news for IT workers – demand for tech skills remains strong and looks to stay that way.
Last week’s malware attack at the MetService web site is scrutinised by The Dominion-Post’s Tom Pullar-Strecker who suspects the organisation wasn’t planning to admit there was a problem before the media called.
Jobs leaves Apple
Steve Jobs’ resignation at Apple was the biggest international tech story of the week. For the most part New Zealanders heard the news through international wire services or rewrites of overseas sources. Siobhan Keogh had the wit to see if there was any impact on Apple distributor Renaissance and the appallingly named YooBee chain. The short answer: not much. There was a short, but well-done wrap of reactions from local tech names at the Herald.
Hewlett-Packard‘s tablet humiliation and retreat from the PC market is likely to make New Zealand CIOs re-evaluate their procurement strategies. Computerworld’s Sarah Putt interviewed Australian IDC analyst Trevor Clarke on the move. He said it will shake up relationships in the local market. Another IDC analyst says cloud computing will soon be the third IT platform following the mainframe and client-server models. Which may explain why IBM is turning to the channel to sell its cloud services.
Stores around the world dumped stocks of HP TouchPads at ridiculously low prices. It seems staff in at least one Wellington store decided to keep the devices to themselves.
Local TouchPad review
And just how good is that controversial HP TouchPad? Zara Baxter at PC World rates it at three and half stars out of five – she says it’s nice, but there’s not much you can do with it. On the subject of gadgets that aren’t selling well it seems Nintendo is considering upgrading its 3DS. Gerard Campbell says the company would do better by making sure there are must-have games for the gizmo.
Fairfax Media is preparing to sell a slice of its TradeMe online auction business.
Next month will see the annual Canterbury Software Summit in Christchurch. So far 200 registrations have been received and the organisers expect to reach 300.
Ben Kepes looks at Bain Capital‘s MYOB buy and says the company could acquire further companies to build a rounded-out accounting software offering.
Tech-ed
The Channel (no by-line) TradeMe launches Labs at Tech.Ed
David Watson and Sarah Putt (Computerworld) Tech.Ed 2011 a feast in more ways than one
Siobhan Keogh (PC World) Developers swarm TechEd
Juha Saarinen (NZCS Newsline) In the bag (TechEd bag review)
David Hallett (Waikato Times) Change afoot at Microsoft
People movements
Simon Eskow (Reseller News) Terence Fleming leaves Connector on wireless venture
Vera Alves (Reseller News) (Richard) Crabb leads UC channel for Brightstar
Reviews
Siobhan Keogh (PC World) Preview: Driver: San Francisco
Zara Baxter (PC World) Samsung Galaxy Mini
Aylon Herbet (NZ Gamer) Preview: Gears of War 3
Other stories
Stephen Bell (CIO) Localist gains agility for growth with cloud apps
Hamish Fletcher (NZ Herald) Kiwi software adds movie-like experience to e-books
William Mace (Stuff.co.nz) Kiwis launch ‘world-first’ e-book app
Elizabeth Binning (NZ Herald) Sky airlifts HD boxes but too late for some
Why are there no stories here about telecommunications?