IDC Attivio Report Spotted by a Librarian
July 1, 2014
Who gets the $3,500?
News and an unwelcome surprise for me a few days ago. I am now an Amazon author. I had no idea I had attained that status.
An MLS—a law librarian, no less—spotted a report with my name and that of an IDC professional on the Amazon Web site. I took a look this morning (July 1, 2014, 7 am Eastern) and sure enough, an IDC report using my proprietary information is for sale. The price? Only $3,500. Seems fair if one is uninformed I suppose.
Here’s the url http://amzn.to/1k9xhQV to the report authored by an IDC “professional” named Dave Schubmehl, a former OpenText employee. If you want to buy a $3,500 copy of the IDC version of my work, carrying the IDC professional’s name, and the IDC copyright, go now to http://amzn.to/1k9xhQV. I suppose someone at IDC will do the “oh, my goodness” thing and the report will disappear / go away like some listings in the Google index for European individuals uncomfortable with what’s online about them.
A thought: Odd. I don’t recall signing a contract with IDC for my work. But as a person within a whisker of 70 years old, I am pretty sure that the IDC have a massaged explanation. I assume that the sale of my information on Amazon is one of those actions that big companies sometimes take without operative internal checks and balances. The need for revenue has interesting effects I think.
Flashback: Pat McGovern, founder of IDC, once spoke with me about joining IDC. I elected to pass on his rather unexpected and generous offer. I was nervous about Mr. McGovern for no specific reason, his publications’ editorial approach, and his consulting operation. That was 25 years ago, maybe more.
With the dust up between Amazon and certain “real” publishers like Hachette, maybe Amazon is on the right track to cut out the traditional publishing intermediaries. So far as I know, Amazon has not intentionally violated my rights. I wonder who or what action caused a report with my name to appear in the digital WalMart.
Is Amazon comfortable with the sale of my work without my permission? Is IDC? Am I? Good questions. When one purchases information from a consulting firm, it may be a good idea to ask these questions:
- Who did the research?
- Who wrote the report?
- Who gets paid?
- Are contracts in place?
- Is the information filtered for advertising purposes?
- Do consulting clients get to speak with the people who did the research and analysis?
If I were still working at Booz, Allen & Hamilton, I would be darned sure that I had my ducks in a row before selling another person’s work with a Booz, Allen logo and employee’s name on the document.
The IDC report title page showing my colleagues’ and my work as Dave Schubmehl’s. Note the IDC logo and title. Believe it or not, IDC sent me this document even though I had no contract or guarantee of remuneration. I am trying to convince myself that IDC just forgot about a contract, payment, and my rights and those of my researchers.
Dr. William P. Sommers, my boss at Booz, Allen would probably invite the person recycling another’s work without following procedures to find his or her future elsewhere. (Translation: Get fired immediately.) That may be one small difference between certain consulting firms and pay to play companies that sell consulting services?
A New Era: Ah, times have changed. Misinformation, disinformation, and reformation seem to be more and more prevalent. But what I can do is ask questions; for example, Is IDC’s Dave Schubmehl an “expert” doing his own work? Is the Amazon listing a fluke? Is a big magazine and consulting company chasing revenues using interesting methods?
If you want free Arnold reports, just navigate to www.xenky.com/vendor-profiles. You can even look for brief profiles without charge in Beyond Search.
And if you believe you have a legitimate reason to want information about Attivio (a company awash in venture funding with its open source, proprietary code, business intelligence model), you may write me at seaky2000 at yahoo dot com.
I will — on a case by case basis — evaluate each request. If your email stating your need for an unfiltered Attivio profile makes sense to me, for free I will provide a rough draft of an ArnoldIT in-depth Attivio report. Also, if you want free search and content processing profiles, you can check out write ups like the AeroText story and 11,000 other search- and content related stories in Beyond Search or peruse the list of free profiles at www.xenky.com/vendor-profiles.
Stephen E Arnold, July 1, 2014
The New Digital Library
July 1, 2014
Libraries were revolutionized when online public access catalogs did away with the old card catalog and made the entire collection available on the Internet. Libraries across the world soon got the idea to “dump” their catalogs in one big database. Worldcat.org was born and people can locate any book in any library that shares their catalog. Next came ebooks where people could download any book to a digital device for a fee and libraries caught on to with too. Enter Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime, and other streaming services and someone got the bright idea to apply the same business model to books.
Public libraries may be lamenting, but people who don’t mind paying a low nominal fee will enjoy unlimited books a month. The newest member to the downloadable entertainment service is Scribd:
“Scribd is your personal digital library, where you have unlimited access to the world’s largest collection of e-books and written works. Our premium subscription service offers over 400,000 books from over 900 publishers, including New York Times bestsellers, literary classics, groundbreaking non-fiction, and reader favorites in every genre. We also have millions of user-uploaded written works, from landmark court filings to academic papers from scholars around the world.”
Is this a good thing? Yes. It creates more competition for Amazon and gives readers more options to access books. Does it mean libraries will go away? No, people still want things for free. This is a great move for publishers and takes advantage of new platforms. Though there is nothing that can replace a good paperback.
Whitney Grace, July 01, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
SharePoint through Rose Colored Glasses
July 1, 2014
SharePoint is definitely a powerful and ubiquitous enterprise tool. However, it is not always efficient and is definitely not easy to use – at least that is what the majority of users would argue. However, every now and then an article wants to paint a “best case scenario” picture of SharePoint. The harmon.ie article, “’Seek and Ye Shall Find:’ Making the Most of SharePoint Search” does just that.
After a lengthy discussion of some helpful SharePoint 2013 highlights, the article sums up the argument:
“A lot of the new functionality in SharePoint 2013 is provided by the previously separate add-on ‘FAST Search,’ developed by a company Microsoft bought in 2008). Until SharePoint 2010, this was a separate product, but Microsoft has now integrated it fully into core SharePoint functionality. With the exciting new developments of Office 365 and the cloud, we expect search to become even more powerful and user friendly in coming years. All of which is good news for the most important SharePoint audience of all – end users.”
But in order to get to that level of usability, most organizations will have to work through Microsoft’s “easy” tips and tricks for customization. We say “easy” because for most people this will be anything but easy. But for many organizations the investment in staffing and time is worth it for the end result. SharePoint is big and powerful, but in order to control this beast many organizations will have to sacrifice ease of use.
Emily Rae Aldridge, July 01, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
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