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The InformationWeek August 2004 Archive « July 2004 | Main | September 2004 » |
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So Web Analytics Can Be Child's Play
IT managers sometimes describe IT components as “building blocks.” But what do makers of real building blocks use? The Lego Group, makers of the popular snap-together plastic building blocks, won an award for best use of Web analytics at the Second Annual eTail Awards earlier this month.
Lego says it increased online orders 18% between the fourth quarters of 2002 and 2003 using a procedure called A/B testing. That’s used to test Web site alternatives against each other, such as two versions of Web page designs, to learn which gets a better visitor response. Lego used WebSideStory Inc.’s HBX hosted Website analysis services to test Web page layouts and other new technology implementations.
Works in Progress
Of the many stories InformationWeek's working on for next week, here are a few that bear particular attention: Sharing open source among friends; Direct to you! No middleman; What's IT going to offer tomorrow?
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Big Business Is Not Immune
The announcement yesterday by Attorney General John Ashcroft that the Justice Department had executed search warrants on five homes and one ISP in connection with alleged illegal copying and sharing of music and movie files didn’t necessarily send shivers up the spines of business-technology managers—but maybe it should have.
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It's getting hot in here...
As the copy chief of InformationWeek, I'm often startled by the way buzzwords enter the business vocabulary. I've never heard a particular word or phrase in a certain context before; then I see it a dozen times in a week; next, either it disappears completely or it sticks (at least for a while).
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Works In Progress
Here are a handful of stories InformationWeek editors are looking into: Is the patch situation getting better?; spam war from the DMA's point of view; and better than HTML
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What to do about child porn on workplace PCs
The story of two IT technicians who got canned from their jobs at New York Law School after finding and reporting child pornography on the computer of a tenured professor has prompted mixed reaction. (See When Things Go Wrong.) What?s your position on the responsibilities of IT professionals if they find child porn on workplace PCs? Should they be required to report it? How might the experiences of Dorothea Perry and Robert Gross influence your own actions? Following are excerpts from some of the letters I've received.
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Business Intelligence For The Rest Of Us
Business intelligence has long been the province of the statistical analyst who uses BI software to help chart a company’s strategic direction. But a new report argues that business intelligence tools are increasingly being used by line-of-business managers and frontline workers for monitoring operational performance and making day-to-day, even hour-to-hour decisions.
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Works In Progress
Every week, InformationWeek editors suss out dozens of stories. This week, the target list includes: richer Web apps; where's IT when you need it?; and patent office upgrade
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Frustrated IT Pros
Each time my colleagues at InformationWeek write about employment-related issues, we receive E-mails from readers who mostly contend that good IT jobs are vanishing in America. Here's an E-mail exchange I had with a reader named Joanne who responded to an article I wrote about undergraduate computer science programs at American colleges and universities. Let us know what you think.
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Economic Perceptions
Call me a glass half-empty guy.
Since the bubble burst on the dot-com boom, I've been looking at the impact of technology on the economy and vice versa. The numbers look better; nearly every economic indicator the government has published tied to technology this past year--except for employment--seems stronger. Yet, things just don't feel right. Perhaps a survey issued this week by the National Association of Business Economists explains this malaise.
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Works In Progress
InformationWeek reporters and editors are working on a number of stories this week, including Harrah's pending acquisition of Caesars and coverage of the HPWorld conference.
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Works in Progress
The reporters and editors are working on countless stories this week. Here are a few: A sit-down with SEC CIO Corey Booth; Wresting business rules from IT; Gearing up for HP World in Chicago
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Works In Progress
InformationWeek reporters are chasing down several stories this week. Here are a few of them. Insurers: All for one and one for all; Preparing For HPWorld; The privacy tug of war goes on
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Works In Progress
InformationWeek editors are working on a number of stories this week, including where Linux is headed following the LinuxWorld conference, what's being done to keep financial markets safe in the wake of the elevated terrorist threat, and efforts to use IT to customize medical treatment.
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Unix V. Linux ? What's really at stake?
IT industry consultant Rob Enderle came down hard on Linux and the concept of free software Tuesday at the second day of SCO Forum in Las Vegas. "I've always had a sense of [BS] and bullies," Enderle told the crowd of SCO resellers, software partners, customers, and employees. The implication, based upon Enderle's presentation, is that IBM and a faction of the Linux vendor and user community are resorting to threats and misinformation to undermine SCO's efforts to pursue legal action to protect the intellectual property it acquired from Novell back in 1995.
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Banking and Terror: Business As Usual?
Amid the sprawl of government contractors that ring Washington, D.C. lies an IBM facility that acts as a backup site for many of the nation’s largest financial institutions. Not two weeks ago, I toured the facility during a media event arranged by Visa USA, which was showcasing its annual capacity-planning testing process in preparation for the holiday season.
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SCO has a plan, and (this time) it doesn't involve the inside of a courtroom
More than a year into its contentious battle with IBM, Novell, and the Linux community over Unix's possible role in the development of Linux, the SCO Group still believes there's a place for its Unix-based products. Even as Linux grabs share from competing operating systems, a recent Forrester Research study notes that Unix isn't going anywhere anytime soon.
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Works In Progress
InformationWeek editors are looking into a number of stories this week, including what's going on at the LinuxWorld Conference, the role of IT in Procter & Gamble's big rise in earnings, and the implications of the upgraded terror alert.
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