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Editor's Blog: silicon.com - what a difference a decade makes

Nostalgia 2.0 - here we go again

Tags: cio, video, 60-second pitch, silicon.com

By Steve Ranger

Published: 11 July 2008 15:45 GMT

Steve Ranger

silicon.com is 10 years old this week, which prompted me to take a look through the archives and find out what was big a decade ago - and I don't just mean the hair.

A lot has changed as a quick look at some of the headlines from that first silicon.com July in 1998 shows.

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Some are quaint: "UK cashpoints to take smartcards" while some are reminders of battles all but forgotten: "Microsoft browser overtakes Netscape rival".

Some mention old technology favourites: "Vendors stay faithful to Windows 95" and "User forum warns users to prepare for NT 5". And some could have been written yesterday: "Health managers could waste telemedicine money".

You can find out more about the early days of silicon.com here in a piece written by Julian Goldsmith, one of the launch team.

Of course, as well as the sparkling copy, one of the things that set silicon.com apart from the rest of the business press - even the few other online pioneers out there at the time - was the enthusiasm for video.

Sadly I couldn't find any of it in my trawl but I remember seeing the silicon.com team lugging their video cameras around at press events - and those cameras were big a decade ago. It was enthusiasm that was a little ahead of its time and it's taken a while for the audience for internet video to build - but it's certainly here now.

It's worth mentioning because now video is a core component of the silicon.com offering again - in fact yesterday we unveiled the first episode of a new show that I'm very proud of.

It's called 60-Second Pitch, and takes a brave vendor and gives them just one minute to pitch their product to three seasoned CIOs.

It's terrific stuff and I can't wait until we get the next one in the series up on the site. This time around I'm pretty sure video is here to stay.

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Check out the first episode of 60-Second Pitch that I mentioned above.

If you're still in the mood for video, then you can follow that with our latest Video Cheat Sheet which looks at denial of service attacks and who is behind them. If that's not enough then check out our predictions on how Microsoft will change now that Bill Gates has left the building.

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