-Joe White is chief operating officer at Gandi, an Internet domain name registration firm. The opinions expressed are his own.-

Despite the importance of domain names for companies and the extraordinary amount of money many have paid for them, the vast majority of businesses are unprepared for imminent changes to the Internet.

The Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the international body that oversees the structure of the internet, is liberalising the market for domain name extensions – the .com or .net part of a web address – from the beginning of 2010. This means that anyone, in theory, can apply to operate an extension. So alongside .com, .net, and .org, we will see .whateveryoulike.

Historically, companies have considered their domain to be a critical part of their brand identity. Some domains have been sold for millions of dollars – sex.com was reportedly sold for $14 million – and multinational companies often register up to 20,000 different variations of their brand to try and stop opportunists exploiting it.  However, despite this historic investment and interest, the vast majority (two thirds) of businesses are unprepared for imminent changes, according to some research we did a little while ago in conjunction with the Future Laboratory.

This is interesting given that there are real opportunities for companies. It will mean companies can readdress the way they communicate with customers, partners, or investors. We’ve already seen a shift in consumer behaviour where the high-street and virtual world have blended. The growth in blogging and social networking means people have also shifted their identity online. The liberalisation of top level domain names will help to blend the activities of both businesses and consumers with the potential to create a personalised brand experience.

Toyota, for example, could create the .toyota domain and register europe.toyota and usa.toyota, and set up sites for individual brands (highlander.toyota) and use targeted domains for different markets such as customers and suppliers (suppliers.toyota, dealers.toyota, buying.toyota). Or, Nike could create a personalised brand experience using yourname.nike, with training programmes, suggested products, networking pages which could link with sponsored athletes and so on. In addition, some companies could do one-off marketing campaigns or initiatives to support individual product launches. For example, Tastyhamburgersandhealthysalads.mcdonalds or Doveforrealwomen.unilever.

Indicators suggest that consumers will embrace this change. As part of the same research, we interviewed 1,000 consumers and one in five (19 per cent) said an extension such as .nike or .microsoft would be memorable. Considering only 24 per cent think .com is memorable, this shows the future potential for branded top-level domains.

However, while liberalisation of domain names is exciting, there are concerns over regulation. Some companies, such as Microsoft, have called for a staged roll-out, rather than full liberalisation, to ensure potential problems can be dealt with.

For example, should .apple be given to Apple the company, or to an apple growing co-operative in Wisconsin? What about top level domain names which play on morality or religion? The Vatican has already registered its concern with ICANN that making .god available could lead to serious, and potentially violent, dispute.

At the moment, ICANN is still developing the processes for dealing with issues such as this. It created an Implementation Recommendation Team (IRT) to look at concerns expressed about trademark protection. The team’s proposals are currently out for public comment before being incorporated into the process for liberalisation. ICANN is expected to start taking applications for new top-level domains between January and March 2010, and it anticipates between 300-500 to begin with.

For us, this is an exciting change. But if liberalisation is to bring the benefits it promises, it needs to be handled carefully. The opportunities are diverse for different types of businesses, and so long as concerns are carefully managed, we think this is a major shift in the internet that companies cannot ignore.

- Nic Newman is Controller Future Media and Technology in BBC Journalism, and former Journalist Fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. On September 30, he will speak on the Rise of Social Media and its Impact on Mainstream Media. The opinions expressed are his own. -

The news last week that the Prime Minister’s wife, Sarah Brown, has more Twitter devotees than Stephen Fry, is a further reminder of the onward march of social media

Politicians, entertainers, marketers and captains of industry are just some of those waking up to the potential of social media in transforming the way they relate to voters, fans and consumers.

But where does all this leave the traditional media organisation? Disintermediated? Bypassed? Stripped of all power and influence?

I’ve just spent three months at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, trying to work out the answers. Here are five key thoughts for your consideration.

Ignore the sceptics. Social media is real and it is here to stay. There has been an explosion of participation over the past two years (2007-9), driven by user-friendly internet tools, better connectivity and new mobile devices. Social Networking and user-generated-content have become mainstream activities, accounting for almost 20 percent of internet time in the UK.

Time for traditional news organisations to take note.

Social media is relevant to journalism. The death of Michael Jackson and the street protests in Iran earlier this year demonstrate how it is changing the nature of breaking news. It is contributing to the compression of the “news cycle”, putting more pressure on editors over what to report and when.

News organisations are already abandoning attempts to be first for breaking news, focusing instead on being the best at verifying and curating it.

Journalists are getting the hang of social media tools like Twitter, Blogs and Facebook, but very much on their own terms. “Same values, new tools” sums up the approach in most mainstream organisations as they try to marry the culture of the web with their own organisational norms. Will they succeed?

Social media, blogs and UGC are not replacing journalism, but they are creating an important extra layer of information and diverse opinion. Most people are still happy to rely on mainstream news organisations to sort fact from fiction and serve up a filtered view, but they are increasingly engaged by this information, particularly when it comes from a friend or another trusted source.

Social recommendation is playing an increasingly significant role in driving traffic to traditional news content. Most mainstream news organisations are devoting extra resources to exploit social networks like Facebook, You Tube and Twitter. Over time, social media sites could become as important as search engines as a driver of traffic and revenue.

These are powerful trends, and not all traditional news organisations in the UK have yet caught on. Taking social media seriously doesn’t mean you have to leave your core values behind, but organisations that fail embrace the power of the network will struggle to survive.

What if the Internet is not really a utopian democratic catalyst of change?

The Web is often seen as a positive means of instilling democratic freedoms in countries under authoritarian rule, but many regimes are now using it to subvert democracy, Evgeny Morozov, a contributing editor at “Foreign  Policy“, proposes.

The Internet can actually inhibit rather than empower civil society, Morozov, argued in a lecture on Tuesday at London’s Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce.

Social media platforms are being used by certain governments to create a “spinternet” to influence public opinion. They are also being used as part of a process of “authoritarian deliberation” to try and increase the legitimacy of authoritarian rule, he said.

Morozov spoke with Reuters after the lecture.

- Nathalie Harrison has worked in the broadcast and media industry for over seventeen years. A specialist in business change management in the media industry, her work has included major technological and production transformation projects for clients across the globe. Nathalie is currently Senior Business Consultant in the Professional Services division of Sony Professional in Europe. The opinions expressed are her own. -

The current economic climate has led an increasing number of businesses to seek new ways to improve business efficiency and function through change. When combined with technological advances, the media industry is one sector that has experienced record levels of change and faces some unique challenges when it comes to change management.

Burgeoning markets such as 3D, TV for mobiles and IPTV; the consolidation of content providers, distributors and aggregators; and the fragmentation of audiences has led to greater market diversity but also convergence which in some instances has limited the market opportunities. Meanwhile new outsourcing models; the re-location of broadcast and other facilities; and a decline in commercial and public broadcasting revenues, have all contributed to real grass roots change as the traditional media industry re-examines its business model.

All change management methodologies provide structure and tools to support organisations as they transition to new ways of working, re-skilling staff to operate new systems and preparing the organisation, culturally and practically, to adapt. But in media organisations maintaining a culture of creativity and innovation is critical to successful change; characteristics that can be threatened by increased processes.

Indeed, many broadcast and media organisations – public sector and private – spend millions on technology projects, but often do not invest enough time and resource in managing the people change. As a result those millions do not have the maximum effect: in other words, a significant percentage of the investment is wasted. We are involved with bids and projects valued up to 50 million euros, some of which can preoccupy an organisation for two to three years and have an impact on hundreds or thousands of staff; and there are even some projects in this industry which have threatened to or have actually cost senior managers their jobs.

We believe that clients need to consider their people from the outset as much as their technology and toolset.

From our experience of working with many of these businesses we have created a list of top ten tips for managing change in creative industries.

1.       Agree the business case before taking the change programme forward

Do not lose credibility by launching and re-launching the programme; this makes any final launch “underwhelming” but also increases the likelihood of conflict with other change initiatives and can result in “change fatigue”. By agreeing the phasing upfront the programme should progress easily with funding secured and dependencies identified.

2.       Understand the number of stakeholders involved in the programme and, more importantly, who is responsible for sign off

Agree at the start what the change programme will entail and how it will work alongside other technology projects underway. Ideally the leader of the project should help to identify the benefits and impact of the initiative. This will help when they need to explain the project to stakeholders and obtain buy-in.

3.       Make the change process consultative and encourage the participation of those affected by the change

Allow time to assess the implications of change for each community and ensure that the affected communities are involved in the resulting decisions. Individual community needs will differ and must be recognised if change is to be accepted and driven locally.

4.       Ensure that there is a steady flow of information into the business and that the style of communication is right for the audience

The means of communication cannot be underestimated in the creative industries. You are working with the experts and must be mindful of their skills and knowledge level. Tailor the information as a “one size fits all” approach will not work, and be honest about the difficulties.

Brand your programme and distinguish your communication from other business traffic by using distinctive visuals and a range of delivery mediums to keep your audience interested, and if funds permit, launch with an event.

Ultimately timing is key; be aware that premature information can do more damage than good but do not withhold all communications on this ground.

5.       Remember to nurture your staff

The media industry moves at a face pace but you must allow time for staff to learn new skills. Never underestimate the different ways in which people will respond to change and the variety of training that will be required as a result. Make sure training is targeted and bespoke when required and allow time for key staff to trial the change. Identify talented individuals; they will find new ways to make the change even more successful.

6.       Ensure that change happens locally

Change programmes are often most effective when run centrally but day-to-day business ownership should be held by local teams if it is to be put into practice. Be flexible about how the change is achieved and be supportive of local adaptations and problem solving. However, remember that those in the media industry are busy and therefore funding should be available for change work. Employees need to be taken out of the business to contribute to the change programme, without fearing the penalty of not delivering a day job.

7.       Anticipate the behavioural changes required to make the change successful

Provide a forum for feedback and listen, so that you can judge the level of awareness and commitment, as well as the success of your communications. All individuals should feel that they have been afforded time to assess the change for themselves and debate is a fundamental part of the acceptance process. You must learn to recognise and appropriately respond to the key stages of the emotional transition curve: shock, anger, rejection, depression, acceptance, readiness, approval.

8.       Put measurements for success in place in advance

Performance indicators and local cost implications need to be understood fully from the outset to limit surprises. Extra work required to produce indicators or metrics is likely to be received negatively. Regardless of the method chosen, in a competitive industry like the media you must always link back to the benefits and when possible tie back to market competition.

9.       Make sure that the technology works first time

Delays and problems extend the change period and add layers of frustration which in turn will damage the reputation of the project and impede success. Make sure adequate user testing has taken place and any issues are addressed in the training programme, and maintain an on ongoing dialogue with users.

10.   Don’t be tempted to start on your next change programme until the first is embedded and you have measured its success

Change is time consuming and tiring. Fatigue makes for cynicism even when projects have full support.

-Connie Bensen is Director of Community Strategy and Architecture at Alterian, working cross functionally to provide strategy and best practice in social media. The opinions expressed are her own.-

It took radio 38 years to reach 50 million listeners, terrestrial TV took 13 years, the internet took four years… In less than nine months, Facebook added 100 million users. We are in the midst of a digital revolution that is shaping the way we communicate and these social media technologies are continuing to grow a pace in 2009. Now more than four out of five online users are active in either creating, participating in, or reading some form of social content at least once a month.

While young people continue to march toward almost universal adoption of social applications, the most rapid growth is occurring among consumers 35 and older. Consumer behaviour has always had an effect on the way we do business and this is no different as social media enters the business realm full swing.

It’s not about selling something anymore; that might be the end result, but to get there, you need to work on the relationship. To get it right it is about listening to what your consumers want. Social media is defined as user generated content and has empowered the everyday consumer so marketing departments no longer control distribution and disposition of information about their company, brand, and products – the consumer does.

Your brand’s message matters but more important is the message the consumers are sending about you. Customers are turning more towards digital influencers, bloggers and peers than company “ads” for product information so negative opinions online can be hugely damaging. Social media sites such as YouTube, Facebook, Linkedin, Myspace, and Twitter have demonstrated the speed with which a company’s reputation can be drastically affected by an unhappy consumer.

Open and real-time dialogue can offer endless opportunities for brands but must also to be approached with a level of caution. For example, there needs to be clear guidelines agreed between personal views and the views of a company for those employees responsible for online interaction. This is to ensure a level of personalisation is achieved, showing the human side of a company, without compromising brand values.

So social media success is about listening, engaging, and measuring. Where are consumers discussing it online? Who are the key influencers? What is being talked about? What is the mood; is it positive or negative? These are the questions businesses need to ask before they act.

No one can predict exactly how social media will evolve but the certain thing remains that it will - digital engagement is the future and old forms of engagement are dead. If you aren’t listening to the noise in the online world you are going to miss it and miss out.

- Joe Baguley is Chief Technology Officer, Europe, for Quest Software. The opinions expressed are his own. -

‘Cloud computing’ essentially describes an approach whereby IT resources are provided as services via the internet.  Instead of purchasing physical servers, databases, middleware and applications separately, organisations will be able to order these services over the internet in ‘virtual’ form, as demand dictates.

In theory, cloud computing will deliver all the benefits but none of the financial costs and technical headaches associated with wholly-owned IT assets.  Consumption of computing power will be billed using a simple ‘utility’ model – a per-unit approach similar to that used by energy companies.

Whatever the wider economic environment, the recent stampede toward cloud computing has been startling.  As big players like Google and Microsoft jostle to position themselves as Cloud Service Providers (CSPs), so relative arrivistes like Amazon.com are also being increasingly seen as technology providers rather than mere retailers.  In this brave new world, the rationale goes, why shouldn’t buying computing power online be as straightforward as purchasing books or DVDs with a simple mouse click?

With such noise around this technology, it would appear that the future for cloud computing is assured.  Indeed, IDC predicts that the market for cloud computing will reach $42 billion by 2012.  Before we all get carried away with such astronomic forecasts, though, it’s worth considering some potential pitfalls.

Foremost amongst these is the question of cost – not to mention value.  Cloud computing certainly promises the potential for some significant efficiencies – but, when many organisations don’t even have an accurate picture of their IT costs today, how will companies know whether the cloud can save them money?  IT companies need to invest in helping customers understand their existing technology spend before they even start thinking about moving them into the cloud.

With so much hype around cloud computing, there is a danger that CIOs will feel pressurised into reshaping IT strategies around a technology that may not be the most cost-effective solution for their organisation.  Providing accurate financial ‘dashboarding’ on internal IT efficiency versus business needs – ‘Service Value Management’, as UK analyst firm Quocirca describes it - has long been a holy grail in this industry, of course, but at Quest we’re hopeful that our own Foglight application management solution will establish itself as a market leader in this respect.

Allied to cost concerns are ongoing questions about technical robustness.  Microsoft attracted criticism recently for an outage of its fledgling Azure cloud platform.  Azure is only at the ‘pre-beta’ stage and this sector of the market is equally new.  These kinds of glitches are positively healthy, as they highlight the need for greater industry collaboration and more cohesive standards within the cloud environment.

Inevitably, the greatest concerns over cloud computing relate to the security of corporate data stored offsite and to the reliability of mission-critical applications being hosted remotely.  Understandably, many companies will struggle with the concept of not knowing exactly where in the world their data is stored.  There are also legal issues to consider in certain markets, where information is not permitted to be stored across national boundaries.

It is difficult to envision cloud computing losing its current momentum, but then again it wouldn’t be the first time that the technology industry’s next great white hope turned out to be only so much marketing rhetoric.  To avoid a repeat scenario, the IT industry must work together to address nascent issues like cost and security, ensuring that this cloud at least has a silver lining.

-- Eric Auchard is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own --

The fate of Yahoo Inc has become intertwined in the public's imagination with the success or failure of its dealings with Microsoft Corp in recent years.

That's despite the fact that as much as 70 percent of the value investors put on Yahoo's depressed shares are tied up in its international assets or cash holdings -- factors that have nothing to do with Microsoft.

Yahoo's operations trade for just $5 to $6 per share out of its current $15 share price, once you exclude its Asian investments and the value of its cash. Its hidden assets in Japan and Chinese affiliates -- Yahoo Japan Corp and China's Alibaba Group -- alone are worth around $6 to $7 per share.

The trouble is that Yahoo needs to find a way to cash out of its increasingly rocky relationship with Alibaba Group, in which it holds a 39 percent stake after it pulled back from operating its own business in China in 2005.

Yahoo's best chance here may come next year if Alibaba succeeds with a second IPO of its Taobao.com consumer ecommerce site, building on the success of the 2007 IPO of Alibaba.com, now valued at more than US$13 billion on the Hong Kong exchange.

Truth be told, Yahoo's huge success in building the biggest U.S. Internet media destination never translated very well overseas, despite the early foray into Asia that left it with lucrative assets in Japan and China. These passive investments came to substitute for a global operating strategy.

But that's changing now, as Yahoo once again has begun investing in international operations it can fully control.

In its latest such push, Yahoo said on Tuesday that it would buy Maktoob.com, the largest Internet media site for the Arab world, with an estimated 16.5 million users. Terms were not disclosed.

Yahoo's international stronghold is Asia, where it had 172 million unique users in the month of June, according to industry estimates. It is the top player in Japan through its stake in Softbank-controlled Yahoo Japan, and is dominant in Taiwan and Hong Kong as well.

In India, Yahoo has the most visited home page and is the most popular provider of e-mail, instant messaging and online news to consumers. In a country mad on the sport, Yahoo operates the most popular site for cricket fans. Yahoo had 23 million unique monthly users in India in June, according to market researcher comScore.

But Yahoo stock gets little to no stock market credit for these international operations. Converting market share into meaningful financial results will take years. First, Yahoo must develop its patchwork of leading properties in places like the Philippines and Vietnam and Latin America into a global franchise. And it's hard to see how Yahoo can regain lost ground in Europe's more developed Internet markets.

Until now, the trap for Yahoo has been that much of its international value remains latent, locked up in investments in Japan and China rather than in operating businesses it controls. That is changing, slowly.

This leaves Yahoo at the mercy of an eventual rebound in U.S. advertising markets. For the foreseeable future, any significant rebound in Yahoo's share price depends on conjecture over the still unknown potential of getting into bed with Microsoft.

-- At the time of publication Eric Auchard did not own any direct investments in securities mentioned in this article, with the exception of a token Yahoo share. He may be an owner indirectly as an investor in a fund. --

- Mic Wright is Online News Editor at Stuff. The views expressed are his own -

When Amazon got rightly torn to shreds for remotely killing copies of 1984 on the Kindle, I thought it would be the most idiotic tech story of the year. But I was wrong. Apple’s just upped the ante by banning rude words from a dictionary application – stripping us of the virtual equivalent of looking up obscenities in French class.

Ninjawords Dictionary, a dictionary app from the creators of the excellent website of the same name, is available from the iTunes Store for £1.19. When you go to download it you will be faced with a warning that it “might contain material objectionable to children under 17″. Based on conversations I overhear on the train daily, I think that’s unlikely.

That warning is just the start of Apple’s interference with the dictionary. It’s also made the creators omit words it considers objectionable, such as the “c-word”, as my nan would put it. That’s right app fans, Apple just censored a dictionary.

Go in to any school and you’ll find English dictionaries on the shelf, accessible to children and absolutely chock full of “objectionable” words. Best start burning them because Apple’s made us realise that words can definitely hurt you. Or at least, your sales in the iTunes App Store.

Initially Apple refused to approved the app because it contained rude words, so the developers made it possible only to find them if you explicitly (pun intended) searched for them. That wasn’t enough – Apple wanted them removed completely.

Apple emailed the developers to remind them that: “Applications must not contain obscene, pornographic, offensive or defamatory content or materials of any kind (text, graphics, images, photographs etc)…” Finally it told Ninjawords that the only way the app could make it into the iTunes App Store was with a +17 age rating.

Even after Apple had forced the developer to sanitise the dictionary, it was not allowed to be made available to everyone. This confused and contradictory approach to approving apps is becoming a common occurrence but it’s disappointing from a company with the marketing skill of Apple.

In 1984, Apple produced and aired a one time only TV ad. Directed by Ridley Scott, the “1984″ spot featured an unnamed heroine smashing the screen on which a Big Brother-like dictator was lecturing a docile lecture hall. It made major allusions to George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four and was an unqualified hit.

It’s time someone in Apple got their copy of Nineteen Eighty-Four out again and had a little read. The protagonist, Winston Smith, works at the Ministry Of Truth amending records and articles to make them conform with Big Brother’s will. Sounds familiar doesn’t it?

Protecting children from porn and violence content is one thing, erasing words from a dictionary is quite another. Come on Apple, use some common sense.

-Tom Dunmore is Brand Director & Editor-in-Chief at Stuff magazine - Stuff has over 1 million readers worldwide. The opinions expressed are his own.-

Google announced on Wednesday that it was developing its own computer operating system. It will be secure, fast, lightweight and - most of all - free. And it presents the biggest challenge yet to the long-standing dominance of Windows.

The idea behind Google ChromeOS is nothing new - it’s built on a Linux foundation and will no doubt share many of the features of other open-source operating systems. But Google is the only computing brand with more might than Microsoft: it’s trusted, and has a proven track record of building brilliant, free services, from search to instant messaging.

Indeed, Google has been busily chipping away at Microsoft’s market for some time, with the Google Docs suite of in-browser applications providing a decent (and free) alternative to Microsoft Office, while the Android mobile phone software has pulled the rug from under Windows Mobile.

Microsoft’s attempts to strike back by stealing some of Google’s lucrative internet search advertising market have had little success - hence the rebranding of MSN as Live search, and the subsequent replacement of Live search with Bing.

But Microsoft’s core business is the Windows operating system that powers nine in ten of the world’s computers. By launching against Windows, Google is declaring out-and-out war - and doing so when Microsoft is at its weakest.

Windows market share has slumped from 91percent to 88 percent in just one year, according to Net Applications. The failure of the latest version of Windows, Vista, has been so catastrophic that, well over two years after its release, many Windows PCs are still sold the previous version, XP. Why? Because Vista is simply too demanding for the new generation of cheap, low-powered - and immensely popular - netbooks.

And while the Mac market share has risen from 8 percent to 10 percents in the last 12 months, Apple’s high prices ensure that it will never truly challenge Microsoft for the mainstream.

So it’s no surprise the Google is will be targetting its ChromeOS at netbook users when the operating system is released in 2010. And if ChromeOS works as Google promises – making the most of free web services, but totally secure and immune to viruses - it will quickly pick up support within cash-strapped businesses too.

Meanwhile Microsoft’s Windows 7, due in October, promises to be faster and less processor intensive - but it’s still built on foundations that predate the internet. And it still costs hundreds of pounds.

Windows isn’t about to be eradicated - inertia and conservatism will stop many corporate environments from switching to ChromeOS. But Microsoft’s near-monopoly on the operating system could be ending. But be warned: a bigger, Google-flavoured monopoly awaits.

-- Eric Auchard is a Reuters columnist. The opinions expressed are his own --

Pundits have been talking endlessly about the possible green shoots of recovery in the ravaged world economy.

But early shoots are not always green. They might want to consider the problem of black shoots. These false starts are familiar to lily growers, when a temporary rise in soil temperature occurs after a cold period.

In the technology world, recent signs of restocking have been proclaimed as evidence of green shoots. Investors wanted to be persuaded and this has helped propel global tech indices 50 percent higher in the past three months.

But a collection of many of the world's largest wholesalers of technology attending the Global Technology Distribution Council's annual European conference are bracing for tough times rather betting on any early recovery. They are in the black shoots camp, rather than the green one.

These electronics distributors sit between buyers and sellers and are among the best positioned to know whether inventory from computer chips to phones to PCs are moving.

Far from seeing inventory restocking, they are planning ahead for years of slack growth, tight technology budgets and higher credit risks from customers.

The industry handles an estimated $300 billion worth of technology products and another $50 billion in electronic components, or more than a quarter of the $1.2 trillion of such goods shipped each year, according to Goldman Sachs.

As middlemen, they have played a decisive role in keeping inventory levels tight, averting the glut of unsold products that have occurred in all prior tech downturns.

At the London meeting, CEOs of the world's biggest distributors said the supply chain was moving again after nearly grinding to a halt earlier this year, but cautioned that this may just be a statistical bounce after the steep plunge late last year. Sales by U.S. distributors fell 43 percent between June 2008 and April of this year, according to data cited by the trade group Global Technology Distribution Council.

What technology sales data suggests so far this year is the end of the destocking phase and the return of production and some sales activity. But at far lower levels than a year ago. Many of the promising restocking anecdotes confuse normal seasonal patterns with actual underlying growth in demand, top distributors say.

"I fundamentally do not believe restocking is going on," says Roy Vallee, CEO of components distributor Avnet , which posted nearly $18 billion in sales last year. He sells billions of tiny parts that get crammed onto printed circuit boards and end up in finished electronics.

"Outside of China's indigenous demand, which is being driven by their stimulus package, where else is demand actually up?" Vallee told me in an interview. "It's certainly not here (Europe), not the U.S, not Japan, so what we have is not restocking. It is a supply chain ordering again but ordering at a lower level than six months ago," he said.

Greg Spierkel, chief executive of Ingram Micro , which with sales of $34 billion last year is the world's biggest hi-tech distributor, says the world is only slowly coming to grips with lower longer-term growth rates. He's not looking for technology spending growth rates of recent years to recover until 2011 or 2012.

To bolster sales, vendors that distribute through the Ingram Micros and Avnets of the world have increased the amount of financing they make available to technology buyers. Despite the availability of such working capital, Spierkel says customers are reluctant to take on new debt. There is also a significant increase in credit risk from customers downstream.

These distributors are adapting for an era of lower sales volumes by cutting staff and overhead costs themselves. No one here is talking about green shoots, only how to help customers eek out more savings on the costs of procurement.

The technology industry is not alone in its exuberance for green shoots thinking. However, as it is considered a leading indicator for for many parts of the economy, the evidence of black shoots, of false starts to a wider economic recovery, calls into question green sightings elsewhere.

-- At the time of publication Eric Auchard did not own any direct investments in securities mentioned in this article. He may be an owner indirectly as an investor in a fund. --