Apparently, there is no shortage of ways to generate revenue for cash-strapped government programs. Now we hear of New York Senator Charles Schumer’s idea for a 25 cent tax on calls to offshore call centers.

From CIO.com:

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) introduced legislation that calls for taxing companies that transfer domestic customer service calls to foreign call centers. In a prepared statement, Schumer said the $0.25 excise tax is designed to provide incentive for companies to keep call center jobs on American soil.

Of course, this “incentive”  is highly unlikely to have its desired effects for the following reasons (and probably many more):

1. This will cost everybody 25 cents more for each customer service, help desk or other such call. Either the government will get the 25 cents, or a US-based service provider will be able to charge its US business customer higher rates (up to 25 cents per call) than the offshore provider.
2. The cost of doing business will increase as companies will have quarterly disclosure filing requirements, related audits and other bureaucracy-related fees.
3. The cost and size of government will increase to administer the program.
4. The switching costs to move already-implemented business process solutions from offshore centers to onshore centers would likely exceed the “benefits” of bringing the solution back to the States.

Other than this government’s insatiable appetite for taxing its citizens, what other reason could there be for imposing such a tariff?

With midterm elections less than 5 months away, populist programs that tout job creation/protection will be the rage.

In a blog post at OutsourcingPortfolio.com, it was noted that:

the National Association of Call Centers (NACC)  reported that US call center employment has generally grown – even through the current great recession…

So, are we trying to fix something that is not broken? No. We are breaking things further by creating an even uglier climate for businesses trying to succeed in America.

Further, from CIO.com:

According to Schumer’s plan, companies would have to certify annually with the Federal Trade Commission that they are in compliance with the offshore call center rules, or be subject to civil penalties. But the logistics involved in actively policing offshore call center traffic could prove much more costly to the federal government than to companies that outsource overseas.

Bottom line: another government money grab that increases the cost of doing business (thus killing job growth) and adds to the cost and size of government.

©2010 George M. Tomko All Rights Reserved

Without a doubt, conference agendas are brimming with cloud computing boot camps, breakout sessions, keynote addresses, expo booths. On top of this are the podcasts, webinars, whitepapers, e-mails, tweets, mailers, brochures and tee shirts touting the ‘new’ technologies collectively known as the cloud.

Is there a bottom-line here, anywhere? Not yet, maybe never. And, besides, if everyone is looking ‘up’ at the clouds, so to speak, there is no ‘bottom-line’ to look at.

There once was a day when almost all computing solutions were proprietary. If you were running applications and storing data on vendor A’s mainframe, you were also using vendor A’s specific network protocols and devices, software, etc. Occasionally, vendor B would have a compatible terminal or tape drive that you could connect. What an era that was for suppliers. Customer lock-in was a great thing.

Of course, computers and related hardware, software and services cost a mint. You might spend $5 million for the latest model of mainframe back in 1980. Then there were datacenters and round-the clock support staff. Massive.

It didn’t take long for people to see that having 3 terminals on your desk, one for each different suppliers system, was not only costly, but annoying.

Are we headed for the 2010 edition of 1980? Could this be, as Yogi Berra has so aptly put it, “déjà vu all over again”?

Well, possibly. Take a look at all of the theater around the open cloud manifesto. By the time this once ‘secret’ document hit the streets, there was all manner of turmoil about how it was put together and what it said. Mary Jo Foley blogged Microsoft fights the ‘open’ fight amid the clouds:

“Could Microsoft really be objecting to increasing the well-being of mankind? I am sure many Apple and Linux users would say it’s possible, but that’s not where I’m betting the problems lie. If this is the same Cloud Manifesto Microsoft is criticizing, my guess is it’s bullet point three that is sticking in Microsoft’s craw: “Openness of standards, systems and software empowers and protects users.””

“Microsoft may be advocating for interoperability and an open process, but the company is definitely not in favor of a document that could be read as backing open-source software.”

Amazon also had their issues as Larry Dignan pointed out in his post:Amazon Web Services: No Open Cloud Manifesto for us

Google did not sign on either. Then the IBM acquisition of Sun was derailed by differences in the board room. Next, we’ll be hearing about the government getting involved.

Indeed, Bernard Golden wrote in CIO.com “Cloud Computing Meets Washington: Lots of Data Security and Privacy Questions” that:

“… it is difficult for individual companies to determine exactly what their responsibilities are with respect to data being placed in cloud environments. This has the inevitable effect of restricting cloud adoption, as many companies will choose to take a wait-and-see attitude, preferring to avoid taking stepsthat they may later find out are in appropriate, or worse, put them into non-compliance with penalty-laden laws and regulations.”

Scary. We now have a world where very few agree on things that are vital to CIOs and other decision makers that don’t get to do this stuff in a lab or on an expo center floor.

At the end of the day, here is my take at bottom-line questions, considerations and insights:

1) You are betting on ‘promises’ and potential;
2) Unless you are a start-up, or in another situation where you get something close to a ‘clean sheet of paper’, do your business requirements require large and unpredictable bursts of storage and compute power? Are you building your capacity for the peaks but otherwise running low valleys?
3) Early-adopters will bleed out the kinks and determine viability – wait for them.
4) Lower-level infrastructure (read ‘datacenter’) services are your most likely first “buy”;
5) Software-as-a-service is great as long as you are not massively integrated with other things throughout your enterprise or have a significant portfolio of legacy and home-grown apps. ‘Point” solutions or other single-duty deployments are likely;
6) Did you just renew your traditional outsourcing contract? If so, were you offered a cloud solution or is there language in your contract about migrating without penalty at annual milestones through the life of the agreement?
7) Will your staff have to be retrained and are they up to it?
8) Can your budget withstand the uncertainty of demand-based services and the related pressures of accurately forecasting, setting expectations and governance?
9) Is your company likely to be acquired or likely to target other companies for merger or acquisition?
10) If you look at how you have managed your entire data estate, up to this point, will you be comfortable putting that data into ‘space’? This cuts both ways: if your data management leaves something to be desired, this may be an upgrade. If, however, you constantly worry about matters of data security, access, privacy, recoverability, archiving, accuracy and compliance, you might be up late most nights.

Could we be headed back to a future that seems so rooted in the past? I hope not. Someone will have to rise up above the clouds and demand order and accountability. That won’t happen until CIOs, and other important players and stakeholders, look down at the bottom-line.

George M. Tomko is CEO and Executive Consultant for Tomko Tek LLC, bringing game-changing knowledge and experience for transformational analysis and decision-making; planning and execution of enterprise-wide initiatives; outsourcing; strategic cost management; service-oriented business process management; and technology investment assessment. He can be reached at gtomko@tomkotek.com or on Twitter @gmtomko. Profile: www.LinkedIn.com/gtomko