Comments on: We Suck Less Revisited

By: Niel Robertson

Niel Robertson — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 16:45:23 +0000

Stephen,

You are right to point out that there is an equivalent problem with OS patch management that only a few vendors have tried to address.

Ironically I was talking to a friend yesterday about the open source business and he was pointing to this issue as the number one problem for most OSS projects – there is no backwards compatibility or support of multiple development streams (e.g. older vesions) with patching. Its the latest and greatest or “not supported”. For big companies to really be able to use OSS, they need more flexibility in this approach and my friend’s perspective was that today, only corporate ISVs (as opposed to distributed OSS teams) understand why you can’t just tell them “just upgrade to the latest version man!” ever time.

In addition, I see a alot of parallels between Newmerix’s business and companies like BigFix, Kaseya, ConfigureSoft, and OpsWare that are trying to master OS or infrastructure change management. The whole DCM space (datacenter change management) is on fire now and its all built around the CMDB, which by definition makes it a change management problem.

The overall truth is that organizations have gotten better at managing technology quality, and technology performance, but not a change. As larger ESM vendors get this, the market will start to roll up from the bottom (DCM) and the top (ITG) and eventually will find its way to the middle where Newmerix sits in the ACM (application change management) space. This awakening that it’s all about how you manage change will drive the next decade of ESM tools in my opinion.

By: stephen o'grady

stephen o'grady — Wed, 01 Nov 2006 00:27:45 +0000

“They

By: stephen o'grady

stephen o'grady — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 17:27:45 +0000

"They

By: Edward Hoffman

Edward Hoffman — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 16:36:03 +0000

I grew up in the south and have been to Kiawah Island & Charleston many times. Without a doubt one of my favorite places in the world. You’ll love “low country.” Charleston is a unknown hidden gem in the south. The road from Charleston that takes you back to Kiawah is just beautiful – old overgrown trees arch over the road to create a “natural tunnel”. As you get close to the island you begin to wind through the marshes until you arrive. Once you’re on the island, its an immaculate nature preserve. Some of the worlds biggest golf events are played there including the Ryder Cup & World Cup on occassion.
Take my advice — make lunch reservations at the Ocean Course and drive back into the private residential area and check it out. Also make sure to go to downtown Charleston. Its a suprisingly fun, young and artsy place. The city is obviously rich with history – some of it dubious being the old capital of the Confederate nation. But its still amazing. Sailboats line the shores of downtown….its just really a wonderful place. This time of year in Charleston is great as well b/c its cooled down and usually very sunny. 50′s – great running temp.
In movies, when the director tries to create the image of what the old beautiful charming south looks like (or used to look like), Charleston is the image. The country club scenes of Legend of Bagger Vance were filmed at Kiawah Island fyi.

I am a marathoner too – you should be set up for a great time & run….maybe a PR. Good luck!!

By: Vera

Vera — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 16:22:31 +0000

I personally enjoy your irreverent bluntness, but it often puts me right off when used in marketing (ie. not first person). This could very well be partly a girl thing …I’m hardly the typical end user for this product… but I also firmly believe in a focus on benefit rather than obstacle in the main message. My own direction in presenting a product like this might be to zero in on the rarely obtainable fantasy of having all my applications actually Play Well Together easily -leaving me free to go Run With Scissors of course . In boring translation, that tells me This is what it does, and this is why I must have it.
Vera