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Adriaan Bloem

Vendor Landscapes and Horse Races

19-Aug-2010

Tags: Component Content Management, Digital and Media Asset Management, Document Management (ECM), E-mail Archiving and Management, Enterprise Collaboration & Social Software, Enterprise Search, Evaluating SharePoint, Portals and Content Integration, Web Analytics, Web Content Management, Marketplace at Large

There's an odd fascination with equestrianism in technology. Vendor landscapes are often described as horse races; there's leaders and laggards, winners and losers. That's great for gamblers, investors, and jockeys. But it's not very useful for anyone else.

However, now that I've got myself caught into going along with the metaphor, I'll make the most of it. As Time Magazine wrote ninety years ago:

"Touts & breeders, millionaires & jockeys froze with fear last week when Santrock, racehorse, crashed into the rail in a race. Santrock, blind in one eye, is dangerous. Bumping the rail he could not see, the horse pulled a blinker over the other eye. In total darkness he smashed terrified through the rail, turned somersaults, crashed through both rails on the backstretch. His jockey was thrown, badly bruised. Experts felt it lucky Santrock did not kill both himself and jockey."

Horse races can be spectacular. And we've seen software vendors careen like that too.  However, you should probably keep your eyes on the field.