Paul, while I think you have hit the nail on the head w.r.t. the motivation of many for choosing PC's -- choice -- I also think that a lot of businesses are (metaphorically) tearing their hair out because of the choices made by some of their employees. Unless there's some cohesion, pretty soon you have a Tower of Babel. And then somebody leaves and nobody knows how to access the information in their files, etc.
Other factors include administration (how do you ensure, e.g., that backups, upgrades get done? and how many employees are qualified to do or want to be bothered with such tasks?), security (how do you guard against viruses, disgruntled employees destroying or stealing information, etc.), productivity (what stops employees from "choosing" Tetris as their application of choice?), and accountability (how do you ensure everybody's working with consistent information?).
I think (JMHO) the world of computers is moving back towards the centralization of data storage for reasons such as these, and NC's fit that centralization. Similar concepts have been tried in the past with varying results, including: dumb terminals, RJE stations (you can see how far back I go!), diskless workstations, x-terminals, client/server with thin clients. What is different now, which makes the concept uniquely timely, is the speed of data communications becoming possible, as well as the ascendency of problems like those I've outlined, and the migration down into the workforce of computers (when only the highly trained were using them, the problems were perhaps less pronounced, and as the numbers of users increase, the cost of fully equipped PC's for everyone becomes more difficult to justify).
Just some thoughts on the subject. I suspect there's room for both the PC and the NC model to coexist.
I hope both you and Scott will endeavor to keep this civil. |
