Data Harmony: Sweet Tune for Knowledge Management Experts
January 10, 2012
Short honk: Here in Harrod’s Creek, we find meet ups, hoe downs, and webinars plentiful and out of tune with our needs. We want to put on your calendar an event that seems to offer a sweet tune about knowledge management.
The Eighth Annual Data Harmony Users Group (DHUG) meeting, scheduled February 7 to 9, 2012, in Albuquerque, New Mexico will focus on helping users get the most from their investment in the knowledge management software suite, which helps users organize information resources based on a well-built and systematically applied taxonomy or thesaurus.
We learned:
This meeting is an exciting opportunity to learn how to fully utilize the power of Data Harmony software to maximize the effectiveness and profitability of your organization for your members, customers and staff,” said Marjorie M.K. Hlava, president of Access Innovations.
You can get complete details from Access Innovations. The widely read Web log Taxodiary is encouraging anyone who wishes to share their story at the meeting to contact Data Harmony at this link. Registrations are also now being accepted. For more information about the Eighth Annual Data Harmony Users Group meeting, click here or call (505)998-0800 or 1-800-926-8328. We hope that Access Innovations captures their knowledge in a monograph. Too many amateur taxonomists and knowledge mavens pumping out inaccurate or incomplete information. In our experience, the go-to experts gravitate to the performances by the Mozarts of mark up.
Sounds excellent to us.
Stephen E Arnold, January 10, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Predicting Failure: Pot Calls Kettle Black and Blue
January 2, 2012
Fascinating is traditional media’s ability to attack a hopelessly confused big corporation for a failure. The failure documented by the New York Times was Hewlett Packard’s immolation of its mobile strategy. The outfit doing the criticizing—what I call the pot calling the kettle gray lady black and blue—is the New York Times. Ah, irony.
Which is more flawed? The management of HP or the management of the New York Times. Let me try to remember. The New York Times lost its top manager and its head of digital stuff. The home delivery rate is nudging close to $700 a year. The Safari loophole makes its digital content free. The company has muffed the bunny with its indexing, its About.com property, and just about every financial knob and dial setting available.
HP, on the other hand, has engaged in improper behavior, the CEO revolving door game, the tablet fiasco, and the open sourcing of a $1.0 billion plus investment. HP bought Autonomy for $10 billion, creating a mini cash concern for some Wall Street types.
Sounds like a pretty even game of management
Now to the business at hand: “In Flop of H.P. TouchPad, an Object Lesson for the Tech Sector.” (If the link goes dead, just use Safari. Access to NYT content seems to be “free”. Nifty, eh? What is the New York Times suggesting? For me, the write up is more about the New York Times itself than about Hewlett Packard. Three points:
- HP created a flop due to various management mistakes. Okay, sounds like the NYT’s problem
- HP had a good idea but it “was ahead of its time”. Right. The NYT had a deal with LexisNexis which worked pretty well, but not well enough. So the NYT decided it could go it alone. It was, as the NYT says, “ahead of its time.” No kidding.
- HP faced a problem with newcomers who dominated a market. Check. Same with the NYT and its various digital efforts. Being good at one thing does not mean that one if good at another thing.
My take? The NYT is trying to be just like the Harvard Business Review, adding value to what is not even a news story any longer. Going down this path ignores some of the basics of creating high value business and management analysis. The information is not what makes money. It is the other revenue streams. The NYT will learn as Time and Newsweek have that trying to up one’s intellectual game does not automatically make the money flow or the analysis insightful. Business information is often a loss leader or a way to generate consulting revenue.
The write up does explain how the NYT sees the woes of other companies. That is indeed interesting. I wonder if the NYT team remembers its original online search service. I bet Jeff Pemberton does.
Stephen E Arnold, January 2, 2012
Sponsored by Pandia.com
ZyLAB on Disorganization
January 2, 2012
We look at the enterprise search forum on LinkedIn.com occasionally. We have noticed that “problems” are a big part of the discussion. If you are struggling with search challenges, you may want to consider that disorganization is an issue.
The ZyLAB blog CodeZED’s new piece about “Legacy Data Clean-up for Email, SharePoint, Audio and More” is making it very clear that most organizations are ignoring records management, policy, and governance until the last minute when it is often too late. But to what end? We learned:
Exchange server mailboxes and PST repositories are not designed for, and should not be used as, document archives—but they often are. . It is very easy for users to retain their emails, resulting in e-mail archives (PSTs) that rapidly swell to GBs of information. Problems fester because the information in these PST folders is often completely unstructured. For example, potentially sensitive human resources-related e-mails (such as performance reviews or confidential financial or medical information) are frequently in the same collection (i.e. Sent Mail) as other, unrelated messages.
It’s important to create folders and subfolders and make sure that your business utilizes software that relegates where an email is to go from the start. Keep everything organized, backup is key. When using SharePoint governance and organization is the key to a healthy happy system.
The same problems email faces are prevalent elsewhere. Always archive projects and individual documents based on your companies set of policies. Don’t deviate too often or it creates a jumbled mess that is more costly to untangle than it would have been to just do it correctly the first time.
Organization is the key.
Leslie Radcliff, January 2, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Playing Hard Ball: Good Business or Bad Numbers
December 28, 2011
Amazon and Google are in the search game. There are some interesting interactions between the companies, and I cover one facet in an upcoming column for Information Today. Think open source, application programming interfaces, and metasearch for data fusion. But I wanted to document what look like two unrelated actions. I find the similarity of user response interesting, but I have been around long enough to know that what we note in Harrod’s Creek means little or nothing where the big boys live, work, and sit in traffic.
First, I noted “buySAFE Sues Google Over Trusted Stores Service, Fears Annihilation.” The main idea of the story is that Google is nosing into a market space where buySAFE has a tent. Here’s the passage I noted, but, alas, I don’t know if the information is spot on. I want to point it out because it suggests a certain spirit, perception, and mindset I find interesting:
[buySAFE] claims that Google may have timed the roll-out of its free Trusted Stores program “so as to impede buySAFE’s effort to raise additional capital”, which it says it requires to expand its business. According to buySAFE, “Google’s acts and practices have a dangerous probability of driving (the company) from the market”. In fact, buySAFE says Google’s actions have “already succeeded in drastically slowing buySAFE’s annual growth rate”. And to think almost no one knows Google Trusted Stores even exists today.
Next, I saw this item about Amazon, an outfit which is losing its “we’re just booksellers” positioning with its spiraling services and products line up. Navigate to “Kindle Case Maker Calls Amazon.com a Corporate Bully in Federal Lawsuit.”
Is Attila’s management method getting more traction than other approaches?
I can’t get excited about Kindle cases because the gizmos lack durability. I have had six, maybe seven, and I have resigned myself to replacing them due to stuck buttons, cracked screens, broken mini USB plugs, and other issues caused because the addled goose still reads books. Here’s the passage I noted with the caveat that I have no idea if the story is accurate. Just read it for positioning:
“This case presents a classic example of unlawful corporate bullying,” according to the suit. “M-Edge developed a very successful product line: personal electronic device jackets with multiple features for the Kindle and other e-readers. Amazon thereafter repeatedly sought to hijack the product through threats, deceit, interference with M-Edge’s customer relationships, and patent infringement.”
On the surface, we have some enthusiastic business managers working to earn their bonus. However, when one thinks about the similarity in services and the companies’ interesting relationship to one another, I had several thoughts.
First, maybe despite the substantial
The AOL Shuffle
December 27, 2011
Cyber space gossip: more trouble at AOL? Crunched declares, “AOL Looking for New Huffpo Media Group President.” Blogger Michael Arrington admits that the news is “being whispered,” not official, but his sources say AOL has engaged recruiter Spencer Stuart to find a new business leader for the Huffington Post Media Group. AOL bought Huffpo earlier this year.
Arianna Huffington, founder of the media group, is now running the business side as well as the editorial side since AOL’s Jon Brod was reassigned. Arrington finds the reported change in the chain-of-command to be the juiciest part. The write up asserts:
By far the most interesting part of all this, though, is it’s not clear that Arianna Huffington is aware that the new position will report to Tim Armstrong, not Huffington. Whatever happens, I’m pretty sure I won’t be getting my old job back.
I hope Arrington doesn’t actually want his old TechCrunch job back. He seems to have pretty thoroughly burned that bridge. Just saying. One thing is for sure: Googlers make interesting managers.
Cynthia Murrell, December 27, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
Google Books Lawsuit Lurches Back to Life
December 25, 2011
Six years ago the Authors Guild first brought a copyright violation suit against Google for scanning books in its attempt to digitize every word ever published. PaidContent.org reports that now it is “Back to Square One in the Google Books Lawsuit.” The Guild just made the first procedural step required to bring a class action suit. What happened to the first attempt? Writer Jeff Roberts explains:
This is essentially where the authors were in 2005 when Google first partnered with dozens of libraries to create a digital collection that today numbers at least 14 million titles. The collection is now languishing unread after Judge [Denny] Chin rejected the Google Book Settlement, an ambitious three-way partnership that would have allowed Google to sell out-of-print books and share the proceeds with publishers and authors.
Many are anxious to know whether Google’s scanning will be judged a “fair use” that doesn’t violate copyright. Google is expected to move to have the case thrown out, but even if it proceeds, it will be a while before that question is answered; the case will be caught up in procedural matters for some time.
It’s too bad the Library of Congress did not tackle this project, since the Google approach seems to be going nowhere fast. The collective enlightenment of humanity will have to wait.
Cynthia Murrell, December 25, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
SMBs Should Seek the Benefits of PLM Systems
December 22, 2011
Many smaller manufacturing companies tend to shy away from Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) systems because of implementation and cost concerns. However, Apparel Magazine does not think they should hesitate and provides Five Reasons for Small to Mid-size Manufacturers to Adopt PLM”. Small to Mid-size manufacturing businesses (SMB) may find that PLM will improve their competitive advantage while increasing their bottom-line.
Apparel says that PLM will improve communication, assist in meeting growing compliance requirements and streamline each phase of the manufacturing. There are specially designed SMB solutions that:
“have a quicker implementation process and can have a company up and running within days or weeks with little or no disruption in operation.”
It also would reduce independent systems and separate silos of data. It is essential that a manufacturing company have an integrated system in place to locate needed information in a range of formats across file systems. Inforbix does just that. They make it possible to implement findability within PLM systems regardless the size of the business or the volume of data that is processed. It is a perfect fit for a SMB.
We think these reasons make a lot of sense for SMBs. The cost seems minimal and the benefits seem great. Small manufacturers – it is time to take that leap of faith.
Jennifer Wensink, December 21, 2011
Protected: CRM Idol Offers ISV Insights
December 8, 2011
Protected: Pick Your Programmer People to be the Perfect SharePoint Piece
December 6, 2011
SplashData Finds 25 Most Common Passwords of 2011
December 6, 2011
InfoWorld reported this week on the most commonly used passwords of 2011 in the article “Stop Using These 25 Passwords Today.”
According to the security and search application vendor SplashData, many people fall into the trap of using random nouns or numbers for their password.
The article states:
“Too many users still can’t resist the allure of using dangerously simple passwords, such as strings of sequential numbers (“123456” or “654321”), series of letters that sit side by side on keyboards (“qwerty” and “qazwsx”), or passwords that demonstrate little to no imagination (“password” and “111111”). Other users evidently attempt to avoid overly common words or strings of numbers and letters in favor of proper names, types of animals, interests, or short sentences.”
The article provides a list of the top 25 stolen passwords posted by hackers for you to peruse. Our personal favorite is 11111111.
Jasmine Ashton, December 6, 2011
Sponsored by Pandia.com
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