Championing the professional management of software
and protecting members rights

Kaleidoscope is full of industry news and will allow users to:

• stay up to date on new trends and hot topics that affect how software is used in business
• find ideas for identifying and eliminating software and IT management risks
• guidance on the latest software asset management (SAM) best practice
• read about changes in legislation and lobbying activities to protect the IP rights of software publishers
• provide links to forthcoming conferences, seminars and webinars, results of recent surveys, white papers, tools reviews and more.

All of the content on Kaleidoscope is provided by FAST IiS and its Members. If you would like to know more about providing content for Kaleidoscope, please contact Breda O’Shea at breda.oshea@fastiis.org.

September 2010 Intellectual Property and Social Media Simon Corke – Rouse Legal Social media creates new opportunities and challenges for software businesses particularly in relation to the protection of their intellectual property and business reputation. Social media can be used by software businesses to promote their brands and products and may form an integral element of the products themselves such as with online games. It can also be used by individuals, whether they are employees or customers of those businesses, to express and share ideas and opinions about a business and its products. There is no fixed definition of social media but it typically involves the use of web-based technology to create a dialogue, share information, provide access to knowledge and develop a shared understanding. Well known social media tools include social networking sites such as Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.... Read more...
September 2010 The Corporate Shepherd - Why software is still stuck in the stone age. Mark Boggia – Technical Director UK, Matrix42 I was struck recently with how similar our working lives are to those of our ancestors, however rather than shepherding sheep we now spend our working lives shepherding process. We feel the need to constantly watch over our flock of actions lists, requests for service, emails informing of us delays or uncompleted tasks, requests for approvals, the list goes on. What is so unreliable about the way that we work or organise ourselves that means we can't trust the process? Process bottlenecks, fragmented decision m... Read more...	September 2010 The Cloud Lead Lining - Get your head in the clouds Martin Mutch – CEO of Rocela Years ago, the idea of utility based IT that could be scaled up or down in real-time to match demand seemed like a dream. But today, a very real cloud computing market is providing a greater competitive edge and customer satisfaction for those who choose to embrace it. Cloud computing is fast becoming the territory of “shared win” outsourcing. In practice, this means that if a roll-out or project is successful and transaction levels reach or exceed expectations, the client pays more and both parties are happy. If, for whatever reason, th... Read more...
September 2010 Does Every Cloud Have a Silver Lining? Ian Moyse – EMEA Channel Director, Webroot To many companies, the sky seems to be the limit with cloud computing. However, they are bound to be disappointed if they fail to see that not all cloud offerings are right for everyone by default. The one-size-fits-all solution doesn't apply, even with something as flexible as cloud computing. Are you a cloud user? The idea of cloud computing has become a buzzword, not only within IT departments but it is also creeping up onto boardroom agendas. Cloud computing itself is indeed clouding many IT decisions today, a... Read more...	September 2010 Business analytics at the speed of thought Roger Burkhardt – President and Chief Executive Officer, Ingres We spoke to Roger about the breakthrough Ingres VectorWise technology which is transforming decision making by analyzing vast quantities of data at the speed of thought. Ingres VectorWise harnesses the power of modern chip technologies to deliver up to 100 fold performance improvements on simple inexpensive hardware. Businesses are using this speed to make data driven decisions at the natural speed of their business, replacing daily or weekly reports with real time analysis ... Read more...
September 2010 What’s in a Cloud? Lisa Comber – Director, Technology and Outsourcing Group, Field Fisher Waterhouse Cloud computing offers new opportunities for businesses to efficiently outsource their software applications and for suppliers to deliver innovative and flexible solutions to corporate and consumer markets. However, just as acceptance of service delivery from “the cloud” is gaining momentum so are concerns about the ability of cloud-based suppliers to address user concerns which could hinder widespread adoption, and ev... Read more...	September 2010 Managing & Controlling Compliance in a Virtualised/Thin Client Environment Sean Robinson – Associate Director, Phoenix Software Many organisations are looking at desktop virtualisation as an upgrade option to their entire approach to desktop management. With users now demanding greater access to their applications, desktop virtualisation offers powerful opportunities to IT departments to deliver and manage application usage more effectively. A degree of caution is required, however, when considering your virtualisation options as the associated software licence issues can become even more challenging than simply deploying an applicati... Read more...