While everyone seems to be busy making predictions about hot technologies, revolutionary industry developments and various tipping points being reached in 2008, I can't help hoping that we see a bit more balance emerging in views and opinions over the coming 12 months. It's probably wishful thinking given that more extreme and/or disruptive ideas are used as a lever for selling everything from hardware and software to management consulting and analyst research, but it would be nice to see us getting away from bandwagons, magic bullets and the simplistic 'single track' thinking that often accompanies them.

Of course that's not to say that interesting things aren't happening, and we can look forward some important trends and developments continuing to unfold in the coming year, such as the ongoing move towards more virtualised, dynamic and service oriented infrastructures, the gradual evolution of sourcing and outsourcing options, the awakening of more enterprises to the potential of social computing, etc. The only real seismic shifts we are likely to see, however, are in marketing collateral, analyst reports and the media.

So, while many around us are 'bigging up' SaaS, cloud computing, open source software, Web 2.0 and so on, we will continue to do what Freeform Dynamics has always done—examine all of the ideas and propositions in a practical, down-to-earth and objective manner, and provide insights and advice for those working in the real and complex world of 'brown field' IT and business.

And with this focus, the 'how?' is just as important as the 'what?' and the 'why?', so our emphasis on community research, tapping into the experience of practitioners as well as strategists, will remain a big part of what we do going forward. During 2007, we gathered over 45,000 responses from IT and business professionals in our research studies. Our analysts therefore really do have a good in-depth understanding of what's going on out there, and it is a position we fully intend to maintain.

Let me finish by saying a big thank you to everyone that has supported Freeform Dynamics since it was founded two years ago, and wish all of our subscribers, readers, clients, partners, friends and anyone else who knows us a happy, harmonious and 'balanced' 2008.