IT itself is susceptible to the danger of shrinking given 2 things: - The rise of *aaS - The mindset of maximizing profits and and minimize expense Some of u

IT itself is susceptible to the danger of shrinking given 2 things: - The rise of *aaS - The mindset of maximizing profits and and minimize expense Some of us have said a few times in the past: building software is expensive. Some of us have also said a few times in the past that: good programmers are expensive. Put two together and you get a recipe as to why more companies shy away from custom-development and prefer to build IT based on OOB + small tweaks. I've been seeing a growing demand of Microsoft Office 365 + Sharepoint Online + Dynamics CRM Online as opposed to in-house installation or using Basecamp.NEXT + Backpack (yes, SP Online is equal to Basecamp.NEXT + Backpack). Some companies don't necessarily put top premium for nice UI or super simple easy and friendly software. Open Source software is also impacted with the rise of the cloud: in certain area of software, if the cost of the commercial offering is less than installing+maintaining Open Source software, then that particular area of software for Open Source probably will die eventually (e.g.: Open Source bug tracking and project management software => Is it more expensive to install+maintain Trac vs paying GitHub/FogCreek/Atlassian to host everything?) We might be slowly eating ourselves as well (in the context of IT). Whether we can produce something new, innovative, and exciting, faster than we can eat is yet to be seen. PS: There are industries with unique requirements and regulations, these industries might pay for expensive custom software until one day a new software will arise and effectively kill customization in the said industry.