Jack SantosI have a thesis that the recent history of bubbles are not just reflective of economic “irrational exuberance”, but in fact reflect social reality – the ability of individuals to influence and communicate with each other. The “bubble” is just the final effect, the consequence of that behavior. Our ability to influence and communicate has always depended on technology, but most would agree that in the last 30 years, the impact of technology has been unprecedented – certainly the music, publishing, and newspaper industries are a testament to that.
So the current IT hubbub about cloud, now going on 3 years, is just another bubble. In Gartner-speak, it is reaching the peak of inflated expectations. But the higher the peak, the greater the crash (to the trough of disillusionment) – and this peak has 
reached amazing heights.
The hype cycle holds true for bubbles – now more than ever. And the message from the hype cycle is that even in a bubble, there is a germ of truth and reality. Google was a dot com. Bank of America, Goldman Sachs were at the center of the asset bubble. The real trick in any bubble is not trying to talk yourself out of the hype, but picking the winners that come out of that bubble. “Should I invest in CDOs” now translates into geek speak with “”should I get my email from the cloud” or “should I use a cloud broker (whatever that is)”
Nick Carr recently did an interesting fireside chat about “Bringing Cloud Down to Earth” at a revitalized virtual COMDEX event. Nice to see the Comdex brand back…sometime you just need those old touchstones to keep your feet on the ground; unfortunately my office does not look like Las Vegas (even if whatever happens there, stays there).
So now its back to research on what we really place our bets on. We need to come out of the other end of this cloud bubble with something that helps our companies, not distracts them.
Oh, BTW – if my thesis is correct, the next bubble is going to be a doozy…
Category: Cloud economy Externalization Future management Managment Predictions Strategic Planning Tags: Cloud, IT relevance, Predictions, Strategy
4 responses so far ↓
1 Wes Smith November 20, 2010 at 1:41 pm
What was the point/value of this article? Doozy? Trying to hype the market? Cloud or otherwise, I’m guessing any business that provides value based on lower cost, better service or both and is profitable is a real indicator of good. Either way, when I click a Gartner link I expect a bit more…
2 Steve Tripp November 20, 2010 at 5:43 pm
A thesis, or a theory? Lost me after that.
3 Jack Santos November 22, 2010 at 10:46 am
Thanks, Steve. A thesis is (per Merriam Webster, and one usage) “a proposition to be proved or one advanced without proof”, a theory is (again one usage): “a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation”. An interesting Safarian (for the late NY Times word maven) question. The difference, according to MW, is the amount and certainty of the proof. In which case this is a thesis – not much proof, conjecture, and put out there for discussion, which this has generated. I suppose theories are left for Gartner’s paid research
. Sorry I lost you – will try to make my argument clearer next time – although note that this is a blog, which makes it (in many cases) just a notch above twitter…I love the blog format because they tend to be provocative, aren’t meant to be fully thought out (reflecting the nature of dialogue) and generate many points of views…thanks for your feedback
4 Jack Santos November 22, 2010 at 10:51 am
Thanks, Wes for the comment.
Woe be unto me to try to hype anything. Gartner rules also prohibit having a stake in IT companies that an analyst follows or comments on…and in this case (based on my comments, and if I could) I would be selling some short and trying to identify the winners.
It’s just an observation – and one which seemed to also have been in the press over the weekend: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2010/11/19/as-tech-deals-boom-talk-turns-to-bubbles/?scp=1&sq=bubble&st=cse
I wonder if Heidi reads my blog?