IT spending forecasts are on everyone's mind this week, but people should remember that a downturn in the economy can actually benefit certain technology categories.

Major Analyst Firms Cut IT Spending Forecasts for 2009
Given the state of the economy the fact that Gartner and Forrester are cutting their IT spending forecasts for 2009 is not all that surprising. But what is surprising is how little the impact the economy seems to be going to have on IT spending, even if industry executives are a little more pessimistic. In the meantime, IBM, EMC and Google have all posted solid financial results and spending on storage, security and managed services looks relatively healthy.

IT Organizations Turn to Business Process Integration
When the economic pressure is on, the business side looks to IT to help streamline business processes. So here's a list of some of the technologies that are most likely to play a big role in making that happen.

Intel Showcases Processor Roadmap
In addition to slashing prices to stimulate demand, Intel previewed the next generation of major platforms the company plans to roll our over the next two years, including a new notebook platform. But what's really interesting is how well AMD did this last quarter, which may suggest that a downturn in the economy is actually helping AMD.

Google Gives Android Code to the Open Source Community
Hoping to stimulate an ecosystem around its Android smart phone platform, Google is enlisting the aid of the open source community to build applications and additional devices. Meanwhile, T-Mobile is delivering its first Android phones with Motorola expected next. Of course, the folks at Research in Motion are responding with their own development plans for the Blackberry while people wonder exactly what Microsoft has planned in response and what Symbian plans as well. Not everyone is impressed with the new Android phone, however, but if you want to know what Google's Sergey Brin had to say about it, click here.

Security Outlook for 2009 Looks Challenging
Not only are the bad guys getting smarter by finding ways to defeat reputation-based systems, but no one seems to be sure if we have the right methodologies in place to test security products. And as the economy weakens, chances are there will be more people trying to profit from illicit attacks. This may all add up to the reasons that security is quickly moving into the cloud.

Microsoft Goes on Piracy Offensive
It seems like every six months or so Microsoft sues a bunch of resellers over piracy. The question that brings up is why a multi-billion company feels the need to sue a bunch of resellers.

Channel Needs to Evolve to Support Federated Cloud Computing Model
There are still a lot questions to be resolved about cloud computing, including what happens when systems such as Google inevitably go down, but it's pretty clear that we're slowly moving to a federated model for cloud computing. In the meantime, here's a look at an approach to managing cloud computing services and some news from Rackspace and IBM.

Tougher Definitions Needed for Green Computing
As both Intel and Hewlett-Packard go out of their way to show off what they are doing internally to be more green, the question starts to rise if vendors are attaching the term green computing to easily to every product upgrade. In the meantime, here are some thoughts on the return on investment on green computing and a video offering some helpful hints about what to actually do.