CIO — Two megatrends collided in big IT shops during 2010, and will continue their irresistible force/immovable object dynamic moving into 2011 and beyond, analysts say.

One is the well-ordered, well-established practice of consolidating servers and PCs as much as possible and standardizing on specific manufacturers, form factors and component lists to minimize support, training and replacement costs.

The other is the consumerization of IT, which is having as great an impact on the business world as the PC, LAN or networking revolutions, by putting the interface to almost any IT resource in a business literally in the hands of end users, according to Ian Song, research analyst for IDC.

CIO — Two megatrends collided in big IT shops during 2010, and will continue their irresistible force/immovable object dynamic moving into 2011 and beyond, analysts say.

One is the well-ordered, well-established practice of consolidating servers and PCs as much as possible and standardizing on specific manufacturers, form factors and component lists to minimize support, training and replacement costs.

The other is the consumerization of IT, which is having as great an impact on the business world as the PC, LAN or networking revolutions, by putting the interface to almost any IT resource in a business literally in the hands of end users, according to Ian Song, research analyst for IDC.

The demand by end users for access to corporate IT resources using iPads, iPhones and other devices they personally own is one IT has a long tradition of opposing. Opposition wasn't difficult when the devices were a Blackberry here or a Macintosh there, Song says.

The buzzword for all this — other than consumerization — is Bring Your Own. The name began as Bring Your Own PC, was morphed into BYO Computer when it began to be applied to Mac users bringing in their laptops, and eventually to BYO Device (BYOD).

1. Who owns the hardware?

It depends on what kind of situation it is. The idea of BYOD was first applied to contractors who would work for a company for a set period of time, often working with critical software or sensitive data, and then go on to another assignment, potentially at a competing company, according to Chris Wolf, research vice president for Gartner's IT Professionals service.

Because contractors often use their own equipment, rather than PCs supplied by the company, many companies were looking for ways to be sure that, when they left, no sensitive data was left on their computers intentionally or otherwise.

More recently, at Citrix, for example, some companies have been offering stipends to let employees buy what they want within certain guidelines. Others, like Intel (INTC), give employees guidelines on what will work, and let them buy their own.

Carfax was offering employees interest-free loans for PCs, then switched to a straight stipend.

Most often employee-owned devices are smartphones such as the iPhone or very new devices such as the iPad, which IT may not have had time to react to before employees begin using them.

Employee-owned gear typically involves gadgety things they want to use in their personal lives, but that are powerful enough for business use as well, Song says.