“Do you know a good plumber?”

Where do you look if you want to find an answer to a question about using ICT or if you want to find out what is an RSS feed or what are the latest developments using 3G mobile access as an alternative to broadband?

Where can you find someone to fix your poorly PC or advise you about putting together a plan for how your organisation uses ICT? Like the plumber or the electrician, how do you find one that is fair and affordable?

• You may use Google – hit and miss and an lot of results to sift through
• You could try a Wikipedia article – good idea but my not have the voluntary sector slant
• There is Experts Online – currently need to register, but a good second place
• Personally i’d go for the Knowledgebase and Suppliers Directory developed by Lasa.

“Of course you’d say that – its a resource that’s part of the ICT Hub!”. Yes, this true, but its not just me saying this. Everywhere my travels take me I hear of people using the Knowledgebase to answer their questions and the Suppliers Directory to … errr compare Suppliers!

However the point of this post is to raise the fact that these two valuable on-line services may soon be severly restricted in their updates or even may disappear!

We welcome the investment Capacitybuilders have made in ICT infrastructure at a National and Regional level through the Regional Champions and net:gain.

We understand that some ICT publications will still be available, but to keep these on-line resources fresh, current and as the authoritative place to go for advice investment is still needed. As Miles points out – this may not be forthcoming, so if you have used either of these and you value them then email Miles with a message of support.

Others have blogged about the events I have attended recently (thanks!) so for the Circuit Riders conference see the ICT Hub page and the crconf08 page complete with flickr pictures and reports from each session. This week it was the Rural ICT conference in Chippenham where issues around Rural Broadband, access to rural ICT services and many more were discussed and debated (further report to follow).

If any of you are coming to the National ICT Hub conference this week, say hello! If you can’t be there – or just want a sneak preview of one session have a look at what Mark Osten has to say about Funding for ICT.