Interesting news article I just read on yahoo showing th US now dropping to 7th in IT in business.

Is this RotW catching up and surging ahead or has the US focus moved away fro IT?

carju1
------------------------------------

Sweden, Ireland and Britain Leaders in IT

Mon Dec 13, 5:07 PM ET Technology - AP

By MATT MOORE, AP Business Writer

STOCKHOLM, Sweden - Businesses in Sweden, Ireland and Britain top the list when it comes to the use of information technology to improve their operations, according to a country-by-country survey. The United States, which was in the top three last year, slipped four places.

The study by U.S. consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton, uses its own "Sophistication Index" to determine how eagerly, and capably, countries have embraced information technology, including wireless access and Internet access.

Commissioned by Britain's Department of Trade and Industry, the survey by the New York-based consulting firm was based on telephone interviews from April-July of nearly 8,000 businesses in Britain, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Ireland, South Korea, Sweden and the United States.

Sweden rose from fifth place to first from 2003 to 2004 because of the Scandinavian country's use of technology by businesses, large and small. Ireland was ranked second because of the knowledge workers there have in using information technology, while Britain finished third, four spots higher than in 2003.

British businesses were quick to adopt new technologies early, including voice over IP, or VoIP calling, which replaces a telephone line by making calls through the Internet, as well as desktop video conferencing, the report found.

Germany was ranked fourth, followed by South Korea, Canada, the United States and Australia. Italy, Japan and France rounded out the survey, which covered companies in sectors including manufacturing, construction, retail and wholesale, transport, communications, finance and services, and government agencies.

On a global basis, the survey — released last week — found that more businesses are measuring the benefits of technology instead of its costs on the bottom-line. It also found that instead of touting their ability to provide access to the Internet, companies are using the speed and reliability as benchmarks of success.

"Overall, businesses are taking a more thoughtful and selective approach to deploying technology," said Frederick Knops, vice president of Booz Allen Hamilton. "We see a tighter focus on value-added applications, and greater emphasis on measurement to assess the benefits of new technology."

Man, that is amazing because I just read that Market penetration for home broadband in Japan and S.Korea is 70%! You'd think they would use it for everything they could, being so comfortable with it.

Not to blow the Irish trumpet but TOOOOOOOT, ok, I have no idea what a trumpet sounds like.

I come from a rural part of Ireland and when I started in computing I could only argue with the spectrum user when I had an atari 800xl with a whopping 64k vs the spectrums tiny 48k of memory.

Now we have our own lug in a town with a population of 1500. Somehow being a geek is chic.

In years past the trade to go for was a chippy (carpenter) or a brickie (bricklayer) if you went to london you were guaranteed a job at a decent wage.

Now all our young folk go into one of two growth industries, computing and chemicals. You are either a programmer or a pharmecist.

It looks good on a global scale but dammit when I try and hire someone to fit some units or wire up some extra power points or worse yet fix a leaking pipe then I am in trouble.

Sure I can secure a linux box with the best of them, but so can the guy next door but presented with a leaking roof/pipe then we cannot find a chippie or plumber for love nor money.

A country full of highly competent programmers is fine until the bulb runs out and someone has to change it. Heck we are software people, not hardware.

Don't they have people for that?

__________________
"I have not failed. I have found 10,000 ways that don't work" - Thomas Edison.
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources" - Albert Einstein.

yes they do I used to work with a guy i got to know during my high school years, he was an excelent programmer but had no idea how to replace a hdd for example, however i knew the machines and didn't know to much about the software at that time (have learned a great deal since)

so he wrote the programs and i designed and built the hardware to run the programs, so all in all we made a good team.