This may be a year late for many people, but I am finally at the point that I can clearly review the tablets. Why so long? To put it simply, I needed real experience with the devices. The logic used here should carry to other tablets.
This isn’t about Apple versus Android versus BlackBerry. That isn’t what I found to be the big differences. It was all about the form factor and how the device can be incorporated into your life.
![image_thumb[2]](https://wordofpie.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/image_thumb2.png?w=240&h=192 "image_thumb[2]")
Was going to have a multi-rant post, but I’ve decided to slice and dice. I thought I would start with a warning for all the Content Management vendors.
Never discount the cloud guys. They are dangerous. Today they may just be file-sharing or basic document management but tomorrow they’ll be the de facto cloud content repository. As fast as you think you are moving, they are moving faster.
Those flying cloud monkeys have no problem throwing new features up there at a pace that will make your head spin just to see what sticks. They don’t need to make a profit today as they are working to make profit in the future. The source of that profit? Money that is now going to all the other content providers.
How do you beat them? Simple, fix your pricing structure to a metered/usage approach and move to a secure cloud, now. Older vendors know the market better, so if they get the architecture figured out fast enough, they can take the cloud monkeys down.
Oh, and fix that user interface and work on a mobile strategy. Both of these can be handled with agile development processes that you can use to match the cloud guys.
Yes, the cloud guys aren’t there yet, but they are driving a Veyron.
I always like looking over a new analyst report. While I don’t always put much faith in where the dots are on the graph, I can always count on:
Forrester has usually been pretty good. They list the categories and share the scores. While I don’t always agree with the weighting of the scores, it is always interesting.
Now I have an exception to prove the rule, the Mobile Collaboration Wave. It was, in short, nearly useless. I think the tone was set with these quotes:
We included vendors in four collaboration categories: document-based collaboration, webconferencing, videoconferencing, and activity streams.
…
We evaluated only the mobile characteristics, not the collaboration category features.
To sum up, they reviewed a lot of different products as tightly related as everything under the “Enterprise 2.0” banner and didn’t evaluate how well they actually worked.
One of the strangest things to happen at EMC World was the announcement by EMC of a mobile client for the iPad. It is scheduled to arrive in Q3 of 2011 (I made them commit to a specific Q3). Some people even said July 15, but I’d be more than happy with an arrival before Labor Day.
So why is that strange? Doesn’t everyone need a mobile client? Isn’t that a cornerstone of Choice Computing? Doesn’t Sarah, the new user, want access to information anywhere on every device. Well, you are correct on all fronts.
The strange part is that when you take a step back, you realize that the market is already addressing this need.
Last year I was pretty strong in my criticism of EMC’s lack of vision or strategy in the Content Management space. In a way I should thank them because it inspired me to write a post on the Future of Content Management that was later received fairly well at Gilbane Boston and info360.
Of course, none of that helps my existing Documentum clients, nor does it help the community at large. Well this year, EMC presented both a vision and a strategy at EMC World. I was pretty excited, not so much because I thought it was the best vision, but because it even vision.
Time for Jeetu Patel’s keynote. Expecting some more details on yesterday’s announcements. Not expecting anything earth-shattering, just some more insight into what questions I need to be asking next. Not going to repeat details from Rick’s keynote in these notes.
Word of Pie 