Comments on: Why Open Source Analysis Will Grow: Learning from The Sumerians

By: Mark Charmer

Mark Charmer — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 22:51:39 +0000

James, two years on this piece still really stands up (and out). Great stuff. We’re now pushing the model outside of IT, which is the best bit

By: James

James — Mon, 06 Mar 2006 01:09:57 +0000

Here is the funny thing. If folks who understand open source analysis were to ever become CIOs, they would actually INCREASE the amount spent with both large and small analyst firms. The key differentiator though would be for these large firms to get some of the additional monies, they may have to change their practices.

Not spending doesn’t always equate to not saving. If analysts can provide a better value proposition and more scale without compromise then why shouldn’t folks pay for it…

By: People Over Process

People Over Process — Tue, 28 Feb 2006 23:24:59 +0000

Up in Stamford

I’m up in Stamford now. jetBlue was only an hour late. No unexpected lay-overs this time. Later this afternoon, I’ll be going to IBM’s Open Source Analyst event with Steve. I have no idea what the NDA/”what can be blogged”…

By: james governor

james governor — Mon, 27 Feb 2006 17:23:47 +0000

stiennion-

as my recent coverage makes fairly clear the leviathan vendors don’t necessarily want transparency - but as the link from jonathan makes clear Sun may do exactly that.

the market will take care of it? bullshit. the business has been open to conflicts of interest for a long time. let the market take care of it? no i am trying to change things. feel free to enjoy the status quo, but i don’t.

Gartner may be user weighted, to your point, but of that 30% - i bet you find three or four vendors massively dominating. who are gartner’s single biggest customers?

redmonk’s breakdown - our bottom line is more than 90% vendor-driven. we have always been open about that. we spend a lot of time talking to other constituencies - grassroots devs, architects and so on/ we also often help enterprises with adhoc queries. but our revenue model is primarily vendor driven for now.

By: stiennon

stiennon — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 11:04:28 +0000

As I recall, Gartner’s revenue is about 30% from vendors, which I believe makes it the most heavily user-weighted analyst firm. What is RedMonk’s breakdown?

Why don’t the vendors practice “transparency” then? Sun could publish how much they spend on Gartner. Each vendor that publishes a press release when they are placed in the “visionary” quadrant of an MQ could also mention their annual expenditure on Gartner services.

If Gartner’s model is broken you do not need to foment blogbellion. The market will take care of it. According to Tekrati there are 450 analyst firms. One of them must be on to a new model that will change the space.

By: Anonymous Coward

Anonymous Coward — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 02:11:38 +0000

I don’t like to post anonymously, but I like my job.

Here’s a data point: I work for a large and very successful technology vendor. We’re clients of only a few analyst firms, and they’re the big ones whose names you’d guess first. Our analyst relations people have a simple criterion for choosing whether to become clients of a new firm: What specific deals has the analyst brought us? What revenue is traceable to the relationship?

It’s an easy criterion to understand, and objectively makes some sense for us and for the analyst. If I’m a customer looking for recommendations on a technology buy, though, policies like this one have to worry me. The vendor pays the analyst for deals; the analyst’s behavior is easy to predict.

By: Dana Gardner

Dana Gardner — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 01:50:59 +0000

I agree with James Governor of Redmonk and a commentator to his blog, Dennis Howlett, on how the traditional IT industry analysis business has to change or wither. Openness to knowledge-based commerce for IT � accelerated by open source methods and adoption � is the newly impactful analysis, and it’s increasingly free and easily to find.

Finding things to charge for � that’s what will be hard for IT analyst firms. See my whole reaction at http://blogs.zdnet.com/Gardner/?p=2259.

By: John Montgomery

John Montgomery — Sat, 25 Feb 2006 01:23:19 +0000

Who’s watching the watchers? And who pays for all this watching? Whenever money changes hands, motives are clarified. Closed system or open system is less relevant than whether the information coming out of “unbiased” sources are really unbiased or are affected by cash.

By: james governor

james governor — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 19:35:17 +0000

its me in the photo - but my hair is a little longer now. have been meaning to stick a photo up - i need to catch up with The Beard.

By: ARonaut

ARonaut — Fri, 24 Feb 2006 19:27:26 +0000

Read our comments and response here:

http://armadgeddon.blogspot.com/2006/02/governor-ancient-iraq-and-gartner.html