![\"Education\"](\"https:\/\/www.mrc-productivity.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/11\/Education.jpg\" "\\"Education\\"")
Every week, I share the most interesting and useful tech articles that I\u2019ve found over the past week. This week\u2019s top articles focus on hot IT skills for 2014, the demise of Blackberry, and more. I hope you find them useful:<\/p>\nEvery week, I share the most interesting and useful tech articles that I\u2019ve found over the past week. This week\u2019s top articles focus on hot IT skills for 2014, the demise of Blackberry, and more. I hope you find them useful:<\/p>\n
Blackberry agrees to sell itself for a measly $5 billion<\/span><\/a> 8 hot IT skills for 2014<\/span><\/a> CIOs as Chief Innovation Officers<\/span><\/a> Software engineer explains why he swore off the .NET platform<\/span><\/a> Every week, I share the most interesting and useful tech articles that I\u2019ve found over the past week. This week\u2019s top articles focus on hot IT skills for 2014, the demise of Blackberry, and more. I hope you find them useful: Blackberry agrees to sell itself for a measly $5 billion In a bit of …<\/p>\n
\nIn a bit of sad news this week, Blackberry agreed to sell itself for $4.7 billion (at press time, though there’s rumblings the deal might fall through), ending the company\u2019s rapid decline over the past few years. If $4.7 billion sounds like a lot of money (which it is), consider that the company was worth $77 billion just 5 years ago.
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\nIf anything, this speaks to the volatility of the mobile market. If I had told you 6 years ago that Blackberry–who owned the market at the time–would decline so rapidly, you\u2019d think I was crazy. This also speaks to the dangers of building native business apps. Considering that an average native mobile app will cost you anywhere from $50,000 – $150,000<\/span>, do you really want to make that sort of investment on a platform that may or may not exist in 5 years? I don\u2019t. If you\u2019d like to learn more on the dangers of building native apps for business, check out this paper<\/span><\/a>.<\/p>\n
\nComputerworld\u2019s annual Forecast survey (once again) finds that programming\/application development is the hottest skill going into 2014. Frankly, it\u2019s not surprising. A recent Forrester study claims that custom software development will set companies apart in the future. As software continuously takes a larger role in business, more companies are using development to gain a strategic advantage. The hard part: Finding developers with modern skills. As outlined in this article<\/span><\/a>, development is changing, along with the skills that developers must now possess.<\/p>\n
\nIn the coming years, we\u2019ll see CIOs shift from tactical roles to strategic roles. As technology plays a larger role in business, and users become more tech-savvy, CIOs will move from supporting users to driving innovation. <\/p>\n
\nHere\u2019s an interesting article on the pitfalls of .NET for enterprise use, complete with the predictable programming language war in the comments. I mention this because we faced this decision about 10 years ago in developing m-Power, and also decided against .NET. We outlined our journey to Java in this whitepaper<\/span><\/a>, complete with a Java vs. .NET comparison chart.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"