FROM the camera phone on the high street to broadband in the office, consumers and businesses have found themselves immersed in the jargon of the new economy.

Bluetooth went from being an 11th century Danish king with gum disease to the wireless standard loved by all those with hand-held gadgets. Spam left the pantry and enraged millions of e-mail users. Burning suddenly had nothing to do with fires but with recording data on CDs.

The developments witnessed so far will, for the large part, be magnified this year. The effects on business will be largely beneficial, though pressure on IT budgets will intensify and there will be more confusion in some areas of the market.

IT managers will assume ever more important positions within organisations, while smaller and medium-sized enterprises are likely to outsource the management of ever-more sophisticated IT and telecoms operations.

Here are the Sunday Times top 10 technology trends for 2005.

1 Wireless and broadband

Short-range broadband wireless communication hotspots, so-called wi-fi technology, which began arriving in airports and hotels in 2004, will blossom in 2005, taking in high streets and shopping malls.

The same technology is entering the office, with Cisco, the American networks company, prominent among those offering wireless networking equipment. Wireless broadband intranets — closed office networks — offering fast and almost limitless interconnectivity in the workplace, will become widespread in the next two or three years.

Look out, too, for wi-fi’s big brother, wi-max. This new technology standard gives broadband wireless connectivity over a range of 30 miles. It could revolutionise communications in rural areas, enabling telecoms operators to bypass BT’s copper wires between the local exchange and the customer’s premises.

The first British trials are due to start in north Kent this month. And with technology giants such as Intel, Cisco and Nokia behind the movement, wi-max looks set to become a significant force in telecoms.

2 More web services

Broadband, be it from a land-laid fibre-optic network or a mobile 3G version, means that operators can deliver more and better online services.

Expect a flourishing of companies operating from the web, with an increasing number of downloadable services on offer, particularly in entertainment and software. Music is one industry already in transformation. With broadband take-up growing — BT hit 4m households last month — movies will be next. They will be brought to a mobile phone or laptop near you soon.