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Web Hosting Needs ISO Standards. Rawlson O'Neil King at The WHIR is one of the best commentators on the web-hosting industry, but I've got to take exception with him on this one. Rawlson begins, "Web hosting needs ISO standards not for the purposes of interoperability but for consumer satisfaction." He goes on to suggest, "While one firm might offer more storage space with its service, another provider will offer less. While one firm might offer proprietary, ancillary services, such as support for Microsoft Access databases or ColdFusion, another firm might not...Firstly, the implementation of standards would define a level of uniform basic service. Secondly, the adoption of ISO standards would ensure that a minimum quality of service is met. Thirdly and most importantly, ISO standards would be enforced by an independent and unbiased set of industry participants."
Wrong on all three. (1) ISO doesn't get involved with the standardization of the service components that Rawlson describes. You won't see ISO specify, for instance, that web-hosting vendors in Category X shall support the products of Vendor Y. That's just not the way ISO works, nor could it be. They're not going to specify that the products of any particular vendors shall be supported or not. (2) If Rawlson is referring to QOS, forget it. The technology just isn't there yet to ensure what's really important to customers. (3) ISO doesn't monitor or enforce. I've been through an ISO 9001 certification, and believe me, it's nothing at all like what Rawlson suggests.
Posted Sunday, February 24, 2002 1:27:25 PM 
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