The Financial times today has four-page insert on the complexity and difficulty of developing international standards for all types of products. There is a passing mention of the Internet security issue. An article on standards for IT confirms Perry's oft-made points about the slow pace, protracted angling for market share, and the by- pass of standards by market go-getters who foster messes. Here are quotes on the last point: Paul Callahan of Forrester Research: "When a company owns a market they can determine the pace -- a company in its early stages of domination can move the ball forward swiftly -- such as the Internet Web software provider Netscape. Netscape didn't spend a lot of time with standards bodies -- it simply joined forces with MasterCard to co-develop Secure Courier, much as Microsoft enrolled Visa to develop its STT, Secure Transaction Technology. Only afterwards are the overtures made to standards bodies. That's commerce, and it's the way things are in the real world." Henry Ryan, convenor of the Iso-IEC JTC1 ad hoc working group on GII: "People ask, 'Can you afford to wait for standards?' I'd turn it round. If you don't, you suffer in the long term and end up with an unholy mess. If people do their own thing then the benefits -- and the problems -- may not be concentrated in one sector of the industry. We're finding that with the convergence of technologies, such as the superhighway, it isn't enough to develop standards for the IT sector, telecommunications, or consumer electronics individually."