Bulletin 2 November. There is nothing to hype but hype itself
It’s a funny old world, in which the topics of discussion are set for us and we talk about them, whether we like it or not. Last week I pondered the role of the analyst as a creator of terms, and therefore bandwagons. In doing so, however, we can starve oxygen from areas of equal merit, simply because there isn’t enough to go around.
What defines whether an area gets onto the podium, and is therefore deserving of sponsorship? The analogy is entirely appropriate, in this race to get ideas past the post. Competition is stiff: I remember a discussion with my old colleague Dale Vile many years ago, where he pointed out how tend, if not hundreds of potential game-changers are vying for position in the CIO’s budget.
I’m reminded of another conversation, this time with Dale Nix, who was at the time CIO for Forte Posthouse hotels. I was in his office, talking about the latest developments in IT but at the same time, hoping he would sign up to Bloor’s IT-Director.com subscription service. “Look at this,” he said, pushing a copy of Management Today across his desk. In it was an article, about CRM or similar. “When can we have one of these?” his boss had scrawled in the margin.
It’s one of the reasons I took some time out from this analyst lark for a while. It wasn’t, as I have suggested wholly that I became fed up of having an opinion; rather, I became frustrated with only having opinions about things that seemed to matter to the technology vendors I spoke to, to the detriment of other areas that were clearly, blindingly, having a major impact.
Social media was one, as part of the ‘wave of consumerisation’ which has changed the way we think about technology today. Hype? Maybe, but then it’s difficult to talk about technology at all without adding fuel to its various fires.
Case in point: here’s an article for this week.
Is Travel the Blockchain Beachhead?
It is fascinating how the number of people saying Blockchain is pointless seems to exceed the number saying that it has a purpose. You’d think that would kill it stone dead, but no, organisations keep thinking they have worked out a good use for the massively distributed ledger concept. I can’t see the fuss, nor the anti-fuss: I wager it will find good use in precisely the areas where it is useful. I know, right? And one of those areas may well be travel.
In other news: Travel Forward is go!
After several months of preparation, the Travel Forward conference hits Excel on Monday and Tuesday. In the build-up, I’ve loved speaking to senior execs at some of our best-known travel companies: speaking to real organisations is an excellent way of putting the hype in context. If you’re going to be in the area, do say come say hi to your friendly programme director!
All the best,
Jon
