Born at the right time
It's an interesting time to launch a new technology web site. PCs, networks, the internet and wide area information systems – as the web was once known – are ubiquitous: what was once the preserve of academia and massive corporations is commonplace. We have routers and wireless networks in our homes. We use text messaging and internet instant messengers more readily than we speak to people. It's unthinkable for each person in an office not to have their own PC. The machines themselves cost as little as a few hundred pounds, with an LCD monitor thrown in. Surely, given all this, there seems little left to say about the brave new world of technology – it's already here and part of our lives.
When I first started writing about computers and technology over 12 years ago, things were completely different. My training as an electronic engineer was perfect for reviewing networking hardware: you needed a degree to get a PC – which never had a network card built-in, or even supplied by the manufacturer – to talk to a server over a slow, shared LAN, which often wouldn't be connected to any other network in the same building, never mind the same planet. Machines with supposedly the same specifications would have wildly differing performance.
In 2008, we're in a much better position. The technology is affordable, much easier to use and powerful enough to do almost anything we might want. This is how things should be: technology should be an enabler, not a barrier to getting things done, and the days of needing vast amounts of arcane knowledge to even use the damn things are long gone, and good riddance. The times have changed, and now we no longer have to worry about the nuts and bolts of technology, we can concentrate on making it do useful things, in the office and at home.
Not all the changes I've seen have been good. Spam used to be an unpopular canned meat product, worms lived in your garden and the only people snooping on your home was the nosy neighbour two doors away. Our new-found freedom with technology has also exposed us. We still need to be vigilant and understand the effects our own actions will have.
This is why we're launching heise online UK – to make sure you can make the best use of technology, without it taking over your life. You won't find us doing massive comparative reviews of notebook PCs, because there are fewer to choose from, they're more uniform in behaviour and much, much cheaper. You will find ways of making that notebook more secure when you're using the Wi-Fi hotspot in your local coffee shop. You won't necessarily find us telling you how to make up an Ethernet cross-over cable, but you will see how you can access your PC across the internet, even when it's turned off. You won't find lists of configuration options for disk compression utilities; but you will find us looking at software where you're in control of what runs on your machine, and problems can be fixed by anyone.
We want to help you enjoy using technology. We want it to do what you need, not what someone else thinks you want. We want you not to have to worry about your digital safety. It's your technology, and we want to help you use it. Welcome to heise online UK.
Jonathan Bennett
Editor-in-chief, heise online UK
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