One interesting facet of the IT industry is the need to learn new skills on a continual basis. New technologies are released all the time, and new operating systems seem to roll off the factory floor every 18 months or so. What this means for us IT professionals is we must continuously update our skills or become redundant. What are outdated skills? Some skills have been in continuous use for over 50 years (COBOL programmers) and will still be in demand for the short term, but their days are numbered. Others are hard to think of as just a pure IT skill (typing) but do have a dramatic impact overall (texting or IM).