The other day as I was perusing the web (as I tend to do), I came across an interesting research paper from IDC Australia. Later in the year I’ll be presenting at the Cloud Computing Summit and some of what the author of the paper said sounded interesting.
Being a collaborative sort of a guy, I went to the IDC website to find some contact details for Tim so I could flick him an email – despite having an impressive bio, there were no personal contact details so I just flicked an email to the main IDC Australia contact.
Three days later (the pipes were obviously working slowly between Australia an New Zealand that week), I got a reply from the Associate Vice President of Sales and Marketing for IDC Australia (job titles, don’t you love ‘em?) which said;
should you wish to explore Tim presenting in late September/early October, let me know and we can discuss the scope and commercials
Bear in mind, I sent an email to this guy as a fellow commentator, offering to share thoughts around some areas that both him and I are self proclaimed experts in. I can’t help but think this is symptomatic of the traditional analysis community and reinforces my belief that their model is flawed and ultimately doomed to failure.
I’m sure there are a bunch of top shelf corporates who spend big money on IDC research papers and I’m equally sure that there’s a bunch of corporate executives who spend big money to attend conferences where executives from analysis firms present. It seems to me that most of what they present is either common knowledge, available with a simple web search, or obtainable by simply subscribing to a few different blogs.
I replied to the email pointing out that I was interested in having a conversation with the author of the report, as a fellow industry commentator and not interested in purchasing a speaking engagement by said analyst. Thus far I’ve had no reply (you’re not surprised are you?) I’ll append an update if, and when, I hear anything more…
Another experience occurred recently, this time even more entertaining. A conference organizer from Australia say that I was presenting at the summit and gave me a call. The exchange is best experienced verbatim;
Her – “I see you’re presenting at the Cloud Computing Summit. We’re organizing a financial services software conference for 200 C-level executives and would like to discuss a sponsorship/speaking arrangement with you”
Me – “I’m always happy to present at event, but I’m not sure what you mean by sponsorship/speaking arrangement”
Her – “Well, normally we charge $20000 but we’d be prepared to do it for you for $12000”
Me – “Excuse me? You want ME to pay YOU for my services?”
Her – “Yes, that’s right, there will be some influential people at the event”
Me – “Thanks, but no thanks. I’m happy to present at events and generally will do so for free so long as my expenses are covered. I do not however, have not and will not pay to present at an event considering all my knowledge is available either online or for the price of a coffee.”
Gobsmacked? You betcha. And if this is an accurate reflection of the 1.0 world I’m sure as hell happy that I only got involved in tech recently… It’s no wonder there seems to be a mass exodus in place….
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Ben,
That is why I promote the idea of having open source equivalent of analyst industry. They are insanely overpriced and there should be some efforts to commoditize the industry. Blogs do play a role but we need to do something more than that.
It’s why companies like Valuecruncher are succeeding – they are providing analyst type tools and commentary for, basically, nothing.
There will be people who don’t know better who go to expensive conferences and pay for analysis. Others will just buy Ben a coffee and then (hopefully) pay him direct – no middleman