Back to the '80s as internet crash forces us to talk again

The 'Stone Age' metaphor you employed to describe the damage to office communications caused by the earthquake in Taiwan was off the mark ('Back to the Stone Age as chaos bites', December 29). True, small and medium-sized businesses may have struggled without internet-based transactions and instant messaging, but by no means did it represent a return to the Stone Age. From the moment it became apparent that the quake had damaged connectivity, our office, like many others, switched to text messaging on mobile phones, and sending or receiving overseas orders by fax.

While the earthquake did affect our take-it-for-granted approach to the internet, it by no means cut off communication. In fact, it did just the opposite. Colleagues, clients, and social and business contacts actually began talking to each other. Our office came abuzz with the spoken word.

Stone Age? Definitely not! Rather, it took us back to the 1980s, when there was no internet and we communicated by phone, fax, telex and a lot more verbal goodwill. The quake might be ominous. But while the damage lasted, it forced us to talk.

PRASAD PATIL, Tai Koo Shing

Many Hongkongers went into panic mode as internet communications failed last week. People had never actually imagined that, one day, they might find themselves disconnected.

More often than not, people assume everything will work as expected - and ignore the importance of operational risk management. The Independent Police Complaints Council assumed its data would be processed securely by an outsourced company - and the names and private details of 20,000 people were leaked on the internet. DBS Bank expected safe deposit boxes to be correctly identified for destruction - and 83 boxes of customers' valuables were lost forever.