Ten years after

Citation

Blackman, C. (2009), "Ten years after", info, Vol. 11 No. 1. https://doi.org/10.1108/info.2009.27211aaa.001

Ten years after

Article Type: Editorial From: info, Volume 11, Issue 1

Remarkably it is ten years since the launch of info. When the journal was launched in 1999 it was apparent that we were on the verge of the information society that had been talked about for many previous decades. At the turn of the millennium, the Internet was really starting to take off, and mobile phones were no longer just for business people on the move but were becoming affordable and useful for ordinary people – well at least in the developed economies.

As a light-hearted measure of just how much has changed in the past ten years, I note that when info was launched:

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  Google was still operating from a garage.

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  Wikipedia, MySpace, Facebook – were all to look forward to.

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  The term “blog” had not yet been coined (and no-one twittered or flckred, or did anything unless there was a full complement of vowels).

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  The camera phone and Voice over the Internet merely glints in the eye.

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  No-one had lost any money on 3G mobile.

To reflect on the considerable change over the past decade, and to mark info’s 10th birthday, later this year we plan to publish a special issue exploring the changes that have taken place and, perhaps, looking forward at what we might expect in the years to come.

We also have a number of other special thematic issues in the pipeline, including:

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  Network development: wireless applications for the next billion new users.

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  Techno-economic modelling of telecommunications networks and services.

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  The genesis of unlicensed wireless policy.

The current issue shows the breadth of the journals’ interests, including standards making and policy, transnational regulatory governance of e-commerce, barriers to entry in the telecommunications industry, reforms in south east Europe and regulatory innovation in Tanzania.

As the journal enters its second decade, the journal will also continue to develop and grow. I am particularly pleased therefore to announce the appointment of Amy Mahan as the journal’s new Book Reviews Editor. Based in Montevideo, Amy is currently senior researcher and coordinator for LIRNE.NET and director of publications and researcher for The World Dialogue on Regulation for Network Economies (WDR). She is also the book review editor for the Southern Africa Journal of Information and Communication and former book review editor for Telecommunications Policy. I can think of no-one better qualified to follow in the footsteps of Chris Sterling, who stood down from the role a couple of years ago.

With Amy’s appointment we have also negotiated an arrangement that will see info’s book reviews simultaneously appearing online at the LIRNE.NET web site (http://lirne.net/). We would therefore be delighted to hear from readers about books for potential review and also from potential reviewers. Amy may be contacted at: amahan@communica.org

Colin BlackmanEditor of info and an Independent Consultant