Is Content Management a Digital Titanic?
February 25, 2010
Content management is a moving target. Unlike search, CMS is supposed to generate a Web page or some other type of content product. The “leaders” in content management systems or CMS seem to disappearing into larger organizations. Surprising. If CMS were healthy, why aren’t these technology outfits growing like crazy and spinning off tons of cash?
I am no expert in CMS. In fact, I am not an expert in anything unlike the azure chip consultants, poobahs, and pundits who profess deep knowing at the press of a mouse button. In my experience, CMS emerged from people not having an easy way to produce HTML pages that could be displayed in a browser.
If HTML was too tough for some people, imagine the pickle barrel in which these folks find themselves today. In order to create a Web site, more than HTML is required. The crowd who relied on Microsoft’s Front Page find themselves struggling with the need to make Web pages work as applications or bundles of applications with some static brochureware thrown in for good measure.
To make a Web site today, technical know how is an absolute must. Even the very good point-and-click services from SquareSpace.com and Weebly.com can baffle some people.
The azure chip consultants, the mavens, and the poobahs want to be in the lifeboats. Women and children to the rear. Source: http://www.ronnestam.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/02/lifeboat_change_advertising_sinking.jpg
Move the need for a dynamic Web site into a big organization that is not good at technology, and you have a recipe for disaster. In fact, the wreckage created by some content management vendors, pundits, and integrators is of significant magnitude. There’s the big hassle in Australia over a blue chip CMS implementation that does not work. The US Senate went after the bluest of the blue chip integrators because a CMS could not generate a single Web page. Sigh.
So why are big companies are buying CMS vendors. In my experience, CMS systems don’t work when licensees want to implement some new features and functions. Sure, the plumbing can be reinvented but that is difficult, time consuming, and expensive.
My hunch is that the companies buying CMS outfits want to cash in on these fee opportunities. After all, how touch can making some Web pages be? (Tip: Making Web pages can be tough.)
I have run across some situations where the CMS vendor created trouble for search vendors. The procurement teams and some of the scuttling CMS gurus are turning to search and content processing technology to make lemonade out of very expensive lemonade. I think in the white goods business, this is called bait-and-switch or selling damaged goods. Something along those lines I think.
Some vendors can rise to the challenge. I have been impressed with the performance of the engineers from Exalead in Paris, for example. But other search vendors are pulling the old “let’s sell it and then code it” solution.
I keep wondering why companies with CMS systems keep buying more CMS systems. This question applies to a number of companies. For example, OpenText showed me a LiveLink system years ago that was a CMS with collaboration. Now OpenText owns and has to support software with similar functions from RedDot, Vignette, and Nstein. Interesting financial and technical challenge I think.
Other big outfits have grabbed CMS companies too. These include Oracle which acquired Stellent. I don’t hear much about Stellent anymore. That may be a reflection of Oracle’s focus on making everything into a problem that Oracle database can solve. What happened to Triple Hop? What happened to SES10g? With Sun Microsystems, I think Oracle will offer hardware as a fix for certain performance related issues. EMC is playing the software and storage angle. EMC bought Documentum and recently Kazeon, a company focusing on eDiscovery. Maybe software and consulting can drive sales of storage devices? Iron Mountain has followed a similar path first with Stratify and Mimosa. Autonomy snagged Interwoven.
I spoke with a company on couple of days ago with an interest in open source CMS systems. As part of a research project about open source software in 2009, I had to grind through the listings in the OpenSourceCMS service. You can find that information at the OpenSourceCMS Ratings page. After working through the ratings, it was clear that these software products were the equivalent of a model airplane kit with the pieces outlined in purple ink on balsa wood. To build the airplane, one had to cut out each piece, consult the schematics, assemble the plane, cover it with tissue, paint it, and then fly it. The knock against most CMS vendors is that the products are complex, tough to scale, and expensive to customize. Upstarts like WordPress, SquareSpace, and Weebly have won my affection.
Microsoft seems intent on commoditizing further its SharePoint system. Also, in the mid-market are the open source “industrial strength system.” At each layer of the market, there is significant change. The big guys, confident of their resources and management expertise, are confident that the problems of the Vignette-, Documentum-, and Stellent-type systems are no big deal. (I think the problems are a big deal.) In the middle are the open source vendors who depend on license fees. At the bottom and pushing upwards are the drag-and-drop, do-it-yourself crowd. (Great stuff from WordPress, SquareSpace, and Weebly by the way.)
Some CMS can be made to work. The clients are happy. Other clients can get the CMS to work but are unhappy with the costs of achieving that goal. But most CMS installations have one common characteristic: architectural changes are very difficult indeed. With SharePoint, one can look complexity straight in the eye.
For some organization, I don’t see an easy fix for CMS woes.
When HTML5 arrives, I think the big boys and the folks in the middle are going to face some major challenges. My bet is that the commercial outfits like WordPress, SquareSpace, and Weebly will become more of a factor even in large companies. Heck, this stuff works and it is a cloud service. Someone else keeps the lights on and fixes the roof when it springs a leak.
What happens to the customers?
I think customers will be like the unfortunate women and children pushed out of the life boats by the bigger people. The CMS consultants will scramble. Some will reposition themselves and declare themselves experts in some other field. A few may invent a field and run boot camps to teach folks to hire them to learn about this “field”. What’s the fix? Easy-to-use cloud services from upstarts most likely.
Stephen E Arnold, February 26, 2010
No one paid me to write this article. Because I reference visually a sinking ship, I will report writing for free to the Maritime Administration and also to the Coast Guard.
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3 Responses to “Is Content Management a Digital Titanic?”
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Interesting and relevant article. Further to the consolidation of the CMS market, is Documentum buying X-Hive and SDL acquiring XyEnterprise.
I’ve worked with Stellent, now called Oracle UCM for about 6 years and I’ve worked with open source cms such as Drupal. There is a distinct difference between the customers of each CMSs. Oracle UCM is not some much a content management system, but is a content management system framework for integrating content into applications, and applications with content. Since over 75% of enterprise content is not in databases, some CMSs such as Oracle UCM can be the glue between content and applications. Large enterprises chose commercially support scalable CMS systems.
Other organizations with non-enterprise integration concerns sometimes chose Drupal in the mid-range size be cause they can serve as websites, and a means to open up to the outside world whether it is collaborating with business partners or servicing customers in a web2.0 style with the option like support for integrating with a internal directory for access.
Upstarts like WordPress are good for a single person or very small groups with limited IT know or support and with no need for integration with the enterprise or control over the content of WordPress, SquareSpace, and Weebly or any other upstart CMS.
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