Men were men, geeks were geeks and everybody who was anybody had an oversubscribed IPO. The world seemed split into two groups, those who`d heard about technology and those who were gleefully reaping the rewards of venture capital on tap, stock market valuations the size of egos and the imminent convergence of all technologies into a single seamless, highly unified and gloriously stable whole.

Reality came to lunch and ate through everybody`s neatly laid plans. Although many broken concepts have lined the dustbin between then and now, convergence is not one of them. The urge to converge is stronger now than ever, aided in part by the enormous importance attached to mobile communications.