Industry executives and experts share their predictions for 2023.  Read them in this 15th annual VMblog.com series exclusive.

Less IT, More Control over Content, Web3 Helping Preserve Existing Content

By Tyrone Pike, President and CEO of FileShadow

For the last couple of years, at the end of each year, I've thought it was a good thing we survived the previous year. We've made it through two COVID years, and now at the end of this year, we've survived inflation, a potential recession and more. The end of this year is an excellent time to take a step back, review what went well and look forward to the future. Here are my predictions for 2023 in cloud systems and file storage.

Enterprise IT will likely take a hit.

With more remote working, IT people are working themselves out of a job. I'm not advocating that all IT workers will go and us random users be in charge of computer security-but because of remote working and cloud technology, the acceleration of a distributed office is increasingly accelerating. Companies will migrate desktop and small business applications to the cloud if they haven't already. Two trends are driving this. 1) costs are increasing substantially, and 2) many companies are permanently staying remote. As the cost of everything increases, secure cloud computing and storage efficiencies will be more attractive as companies look to reduce their operating costs. In addition, as transportation costs increase, more people are conducting some or all their work outside of the office, and ubiquitous access to their data will only accelerate that migration.

Regarding the IT staff, much of our companies' staff have been used to implement enterprise software. To get all your computers and enterprise systems running, you'll still need to utilize IT -they're the ones who need to know how things work. But, because IT staff for most corporations is a sunk cost, remote environments create different needs. Let's say companies offer $142,000 salaries or higher for IT staff. If you have one or two of those levels of people, you're up to $300,000 in staff costs.

As employees work remotely, companies will eliminate some of those costs. Many companies are moving from enterprise office apps to something like Google Workspace. How much training do I need for an IT person to make their Workspaces work? Not much. Google has the infrastructure. It has the sharing capability. Employees can find most of the training they need on Google's site or YouTube. A company doesn't have to have a centralized command and control infrastructure hierarchy to make things work. So, the cost of managing the apps is less expensive. The biggest concern for IT companies will be security, much less on app maintenance and training for using those apps.

It's going to be a more significant change for smaller companies. Over time, smaller companies will outsource on an as-needed basis or eliminate IT staff altogether because of financial pressure. Things are getting too expensive for them to operate for infrastructure or employee support.

People are taking control over their content - and not leaving it up to social media to decide.

Changes in the social media landscape in 2022 have caused people to consider and explore alternatives to traditional social media, so individuals and families have control over their content while still being able to share that content with family members.

Privacy is also a concern. One of the primary complaints I hear is that there isn't a good way for individuals to share photos and videos with their families. It seems like a counterintuitive issue with all the social media available.

While you can post content on your social media, you ultimately don't have control over where it might be shared, who might access it, and how you maintain control over it going forward. And there are significant numbers of people leaving social media platforms, especially the big ones, and they are doing it for various reasons, one of which is control over their content.

However, one challenge is figuring out what the best platforms are to hold not only their content but also share it. In 2023, they will be looking for better alternatives, allowing them to share their content with friends and family while maintaining control over how they use it.

Web3 will aid preservation activities.

With each year, old photographs and documents are deteriorating. Even if the printed items are sealed, the acids in the printing process and the paper turn them yellow. Both color and black/white film also fade over time due to oxidation. Preserving these photos, files, and documents into a digital form will become a higher priority before they are lost. The UK is beginning to address this with a big preservation push. And here in the states, we've lost almost everyone from what's considered the Greatest Generation - those who lived during World War II. We're losing the photos and documents. And, we're losing the context of what they experienced. They know the stories behind the images and documents. Their knowledge about past events will also be lost unless captured in digital form, such as audio recordings.

Web3 will help improve the quality and value of preserved documents. AI will be used more broadly to identify objects in old, scanned photographs archived/stored in the cloud. But AI alone cannot tell the entire story. Archivists, family history buffs and people interested in preserving memories will use audio recordings as annotations of people who were there at the time, telling their back story of the places, events and lessons learned. These recordings will be associated with the images, creating a more complete story. AI will further the experience by transcribing the recordings, making everything searchable. It's another way AI can be used by mere mortals.

We at FileShadow, hope you have a very successful 2023, and that at the end of the year, we've handled all the challenges presented to us in the upcoming year.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Mr. Tyrone F. Pike is the Founder of FileShadow, Inc. and serves as its Chief Executive Officer and President. With more than 35 years of experience in the high-tech sector, Tyrone has held numerous top executive positions in software, software systems integration and networking infrastructure companies, including Solid Instance, Sparxent Inc., Bravara Communication, Inc. and InterNAP Network Services Corporate. In 1996, he founded VPNX.com and served as its President and Chief Executive Officer. As Founder and Chairman of LAN Systems, he guided its successful product line and then negotiated the sale of LAN Systems' software division to Intel Corporation and its systems integration division to RR Donnelly & Sons. His expertise spans across a wide range of domain areas: cloud computing, messaging, archiving, disaster recovery, networking and Web services. He serves as the Chairman of the Board of Solid Instance, Inc. He has served as a Director of Citrix Systems, Inc. and Sparxent Inc. Mr. Pike holds an AB in Architecture from Princeton University.