Rupert Goodwins' Diary

Monday 20/10/2003
Our intrepid telco ranger, Graeme Wearden, is off again. This time, it's to the holy grounds of BT to meet Dave Hughes, CEO of Wireless Broadband. BT's got a big push on for mobile office magic, where you can "free your workers from their desks and make them effective and contactable anywhere," and Hughes is the driving force.

Now, BT isn't one of those companies that says one thing and does another, oh no. In that lovely marketing image, it eats its own dog food. When Wearden arrives at Buzby HQ it is at once apparent that Dave Hughes has indeed been freed from his desk. Doubtless, he's being extremely effective somewhere. It's just the contactable bit that proves a problem – hey, two out of three ain't bad.

For forty-five minutes, the PR plies our man with coffee and digestives in the canteen while despatching ever more frantic messages to all points within the mighty BT machine. Every so often, she leaps up, points at a surprised passer-bt and goes "Ah! Here he is!" only to find that here he isn't. "There are a lot of balding men in suits in BT," she sighs, and the increasingly caffeinated hack can only agree.

Eventually, all is well. Hughes shows up – he's been with a customer and had his mobile on silent – and Scoop gets his story.

And I get mine. Now that's what I call a productive use of mobile technology.