I guess my post last night stood out while most others were busy railing on Oracle. I got a couple of messages asking why Oracle deserved my kind words.
Whether a tech vendor or a topic I tend to rely on multiple channels for my opinions – my social channels (Twitter, the Enterprise Irregulars, LinkedIn etc), the over 100 sources I scrounge each year for my innovation blog New Florence, my book research (several hundred sources in last couple of years), my consulting clients, vendor exec access and commentary, industry analysts and financial analysts. For startups and consumer tech I tend to rely more on the left side of the source list, for mature enterprise vendors, more on the right side. With vendors like Oracle, SAP, IBM, HP with vibrant customer bases I tend to rely more on the sources in the middle.
If I relied only on the left side, I would have a very negative view of Oracle. SAP, in particular, does better in social channels. Right side, till last night, had too positive a view of Oracle. The ones in the middle provide the balance. And Oracle does as well here if not better than SAP, HP and IBM. While they do not call Oracle a “bed of roses”, I get much more negative customer feedback on value from SAP or IBM investments. SAP provides much easier executive access but when you measure progress against problems they acknowledge in previous meetings, the results are often disheartening. After a while you learn to discount that channel.
It’s like my political views. I tend to vote for the candidate, not on party lines. So I am not surprised when I get “WTF?” comments.
