Insights and Articles
Introducing the Practical AI Guide for Technology Leaders
It is becoming almost impossible to have a business conversation without AI showing up somewhere. Sometimes that is entirely justified. Sometimes I suspect somebody has simply decided that adding the letters AI to a presentation makes it sound more interesting. Either...
Everyone Wants AI. Nobody Wants the Data Centre Next Door.
There is something slightly odd happening with artificial intelligence. We want more of it everywhere: in search, accounting software, customer service, coding tools and increasingly in the businesses we run. What we seem rather less enthusiastic about is having the...
What Really Sustains National Prosperity?
If national prosperity could be explained by a single economic policy, governments would presumably have discovered the formula long ago. They haven’t, and perhaps one reason is that we spend too much time looking for one. Denmark,...
Is the Internet Working?
A friend of mine recently launched a website called NetworkUtils.org. It contains 42 free networking tools covering everything from DNS and IP addresses to email, security and website diagnostics. Now, I appreciate that for most normal people...
Introducing the Practical AI Guide for Technology Leaders
It is becoming almost impossible to have a business conversation without AI showing up somewhere. Sometimes that is entirely justified. Sometimes I suspect somebody has simply decided that adding the letters AI to a presentation makes it sound more interesting. Either...
Everyone Wants AI. Nobody Wants the Data Centre Next Door.
There is something slightly odd happening with artificial intelligence. We want more of it everywhere: in search, accounting software, customer service, coding tools and increasingly in the businesses we run. What we seem rather less enthusiastic about is having the...
What Really Sustains National Prosperity?
If national prosperity could be explained by a single economic policy, governments would presumably have discovered the formula long ago. They haven’t, and perhaps one reason is that we spend too much time looking for one. Denmark,...
Is the Internet Working?
A friend of mine recently launched a website called NetworkUtils.org. It contains 42 free networking tools covering everything from DNS and IP addresses to email, security and website diagnostics. Now, I appreciate that for most normal people...
AI Infrastructure Is Starting to Follow Energy, Not Just Users
For a long time, Europe's plan for digital infrastructure has been pretty straightforward: build where lots of people live, where businesses need it, and where fast connections are a must. This approach made cities like Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, Paris,...
Why Big Technology Trends Usually Disappoint Before They Deliver
There is a predictable cycle in technology. Something new arrives, investors declare it revolutionary, consultants produce elaborate diagrams explaining why everything is about to change, and companies start spending money partly out of optimism and partly out of fear...
Why Cheap Thinking Is So Expensive
There is a line from Terry Pratchett that has no business being as useful in boardrooms as it is on rainy cobbled streets. It comes from Men at Arms, via Samuel Vimes, a man who understands both poverty and wet feet better than most consultants understand...
The Network Is Becoming Invisible. Splendid. Now Who Pays for It?
There was a moment at FutureNet World where you could almost hear the industry collectively nodding. Not because anything particularly shocking had been said. Quite the opposite. Everything sounded inevitable. AI will run the networks. OSS will...
To Infinity and Beyond? Or Just Very Expensive Thinking
The idea arrives, as these things often do, dressed up as destiny. AI is gobbling power at a rate that makes even the most ambitious data centre plans look like a child’s Lego project. The grid is groaning, planners are dithering, and locals would rather not have...
The AI Paradox
On productivity, trust, and the physical limits behind the AI boom Writing used to be thinking. Sitting in front of a blank sheet of paper (or later a screen) and waiting for something to happen (or, in my case, to not happen). For a long, long...