Ed Brill

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1. 1  Carl Tyler http://www.iminstant.com | 10/18/2007 7:45:51 PM

   The classic "Innovator's Dilemma" could play out in a very visible way on this site.

   This plays out all the time, even more so since blogs and comments came to exist in the public realm. Damn, it used to exist in the Compuserve forums. There have been lots of ideas from Customers that IBM/Lotus/whoever have chosen to ignore over years and it's a calculated risk they take, will they still buy without this feature or not? Whether it be in comments on your blog, partner forums, notes forum, beta forums, it's a fact of life. For example Workplace probably wouldn't have happened if IBM/Lotus had listened to partners etc. IMHO.

   I praise Bruce and the other folks for taking this initiative, and I am really excited to see many other IBMers seeing the great value they can obtain from this. Sure there's no commitment for IBM to deliver what is promoted at ideaJam, but it's a really cheap marketing study to get a rough unscientific survey of what people are interested in seeing improved. Will there be some voices louder than others sure, but that's why you have Product Managers to figure out which is real and what is just a squeaky wheel.

   I Personally see a greater value for IBM, not in the website, but the cool template that's been built. I see a great deal of value in that for companies that choose to use it internally on their intranets to track ideas. IBM sometimes asks what would make a good template to ship with notes/domino, right there is an example of a great one.

1. 2  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/18/2007 8:41:37 PM

   Carl,

   I think the possibility exists for IdeaJam to be a more prominent way for the "dilemma" to play out than those other ways. Comments on a blog or forum may have a different magnitude than hundreds of votes. I guess we'll see.

   Not sure whether "excited to see many other IBMers seeing the great value" was meant as a slap or not... it's not that I don't see the value, I just caution that it's not the only such place for value. Having spent much of my international travel this year in non-English-speaking regions, I'm acutely aware that those customers are under-represented in these venues.

   As for "Workplace probably wouldn't have happened if IBM/Lotus had listened to partners etc. IMHO" -- Carl, Workplace probably wouldn't have happened if IBM/Lotus had listened to some of its own employees.

1. 3  Sean Burgess http://www.phigsaidwhat.com/ | 10/18/2007 9:03:28 PM

   Whether or not it works will have to be seen, but to me the beauty of Idea Jam is the is the extremely low entrance fee for getting involved in the community. Once you get beyond the initial "Please Help Me" stage that the forums are good for, actually getting involved in the community takes a fair bit of work. You could simply be a commentor on the 100+ Domino blogs that currently exist, but that means that you never have a place to put original ideas forward. You could start a blog of your own, but that takes constant vigilance and care if you ever want anyone to read what you write. Now, you will be able to go to Idea Jam and put forward an original, creative idea that others in the community can view and comment on. And because it's on Idea Jam, at least for the short term, you know that someone at IBM/Lotus will probably see it.

1. 4  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 10/18/2007 9:08:06 PM

   Workplace would never have happened if IBM/Lotus had not tried to cram a bad idea down everyone's throat!;-)

   Now back to the topic at hand...Nathan put it very succinctly in the article I wrote about ideaJam on nowPublic ( { Link } ):

   "I'd like to think it'll be great, but it's difficult to say when there's no cost to promote or demote an idea. Basically, you can vouch or trash something, and there's no cost to that action. So you could literally go through and just say "Yes" to everything. I think that's dependent on whether people evaluate carefully [before making comments or voting]."

   The Lotus blogging community is very small as a percentage of the overall Lotus community. It has been very hard to get others to participate for many reasons. The challenge will be to find a way to get them to participate in this initiative.

1. 5  Chris Toohey http://www.dominoguru.com | 10/18/2007 9:51:40 PM

   I think I get what Ed's saying... or I could just be in need of more coffee:

   Big Blue didn't take *my* suggestion to have every template emblazed with "Chris Toohey rocks!"... no one is listening to the CUSTOMER man!

   I think that the people that are involved with this solution now and the early adopters of this extention-of-the-Lotus-community will forge the community solution. And I'm talking IdeaJam.net specifically, not the uber-sweet template that's running it - that just shows how kick-ass Domino can be: IBM out-of-the-box template teams, please take notes...

   Take a look at Wikipedia. That is a solution that's using a pretty simple-yet-innovative tool to allow the online community to maintain (in this example) a knowledgebase. Sure, you're going to have that minority of walk-by users who say that there are "zealots" that patrol Wikipedia and censor blah-blah-blah, but the online community and the solution's customer (the typical Wikipedia user) benefit.

   I think the same will hold true for IJ - you've got a solid group of people that understand that not *every* request is going to be quickly adding to the rNext blueprint. As long as the community - and especially as said community grows - communicates that to it's members AND THE VENDOR KEEPS OPEN COMMUNICATION WITH SAID COMMUNITY, there shouldn't be any sour grapes. We understand not everything is going to make the cut. I think the majority of us have developed enough solutions ourselves to understand that there are many reasons that a particular feature or function just didn't make it into this release. It's when that community, who continually make themselves both loud and available, is blatantly ignored that you're going to run into problems.

   And if you do that, Innovator's Dilemma is the *least* of your worries!

1. 6  Dan Sickles  | 10/18/2007 10:41:27 PM

   For me, the question is whether the responses could ever be representative of actual customer demand. I've got tons of ideas but they are very heavily weighted toward the development platform. I personally have little concern about Notes as a day to day email/collaboration system. If I post and vote profusely and 20 hard working admins representing a significant number of licenses don't post at all, it won't be representative. That doesn't mean it's not valuable. I hope it is...to IBM, the community and to a stream of new Elguji customers ;-)

   I've found that I don't pay much attention to the votes on these kinds of applications. I just subscribe to "new" and evaluate on a quick scan. I think that the value of each individual votes varies with context. In other words, I might value Fran's vote on Idea-A more than Fred's vote on Idea-A and vice versa on Idea-B. If I can't correlate ratings to people, the ranking has little meaning for me. Echoing Nathan...reputation and actual customer representation factors would increase the value (by increasing the cost). Perhaps the idea for profiles is a start in that direction.

1. 7  Ian Randall  | 10/18/2007 11:47:25 PM

   Ed, the fact that you are happy to blog about this topic (before the official launch of IdeaJam), is a testament in my opinion to the strength and candour of the relationship between Lotus and the community.

   However, I don't think that anyone within the community expects that IdeaJam will fundamentally change the way that IBM/Lotus develops products in the future or that the opinions of one set of stakeholders through IdeaJam will override the influence of all others within the Lotus development process. But it does provide a simple and elegant way for Lotus to gauge the changing priorities of the community.

   This is a social experiment, pure and simple, and some people within Lotus seem open to the potential of IdeaJam, even if it fails. To paraphrase Alexander Graham Bell when interviewed by a journalist “at least I now know a thousand ways how Not to build a light bulb”. I’d rather witness a heroic failure rather than nothing.

   I would also like to think that Lotus would be happy to provide feedback to IdeaJam with a simple explanation of why any of the top ten ideas in the list have been rejected. Or alternatively, if any of the ideas are adopted, to give IdeaJam public credit for the idea in the Lotus product release notes.

   As for the risk of product weaknesses being exploited by competitors, I think that the many ex-Loti who have passed over to the dark side, already have a pretty good handle on the weaknesses of Lotus products.

   Another thing to remember is that IdeaJam is focussed on ways in which Lotus products could be improved, and not simply criticisms of the products (provided that the site is properly moderated to keep out the riff-raff). But even naysayers have had their value (LotusNotesSucks is just one notable example).

   And as others have already commented, the IdeaJam template (running on Domino) is a great showcase for the strengths of the Lotus collaborative platform.

1. 8  Tim Tripcony http://www.timtripcony.com | 10/19/2007 12:40:52 AM

   Another element to all this is partner and open source involvement. To assume that a high vote count on an idea will obligate IBM to implement it is, in my opinion, a distortion of the potential of the site. Instead, if an idea seems "popular" but does not become part of the product, this may highlight that idea as ripe for a partner solution or OpenNTF project.

1. 9  Matt White http://www.11tmr.com | 10/19/2007 1:59:38 AM

   I'd just like to add my agreement to Sean's assertion. The main thing that I hope to see with the Idea Jam is contribution from people who aren't already heavily involved in the blogging community. If just one good idea bubbles to the top and gets adopted in Notes 9 (or 10 or whatever) then the site has some value.

   And even if the top feature request doesn't get implemented then at least Lotus knows what a portion of the community (however unrepresentative that portion may be) is thinking and wanting from their products.

   Overall, I really can't wait until 20th November to see what the reaction is amongst the community.

1. 10  Axel  | 10/19/2007 2:46:21 AM

   Only few people will have sort of a jacobinic view that new features will be driven by ideaJam. As far as I understand its not intended as maoist cultural revolution 2.0. I hope it will be usefull for idea gathering.

   Personally in my little projects I get some extra motivation when I realize that the future users really think about their system and processes it shall support. Maybe for Lotus the same.

   I hope ideaJam won't degrade into a bash-fest and a home for conspiracy theorists. Maybe a little filter for words like Garnet or Workplace could help.

1. 11  Nathan T. Freeman http://nathan.lotus911.com | 10/19/2007 5:55:44 AM

   @7 - Ian, nitpick... that was Edison, not Bell. :-D

   @10 - If we're going to have a filter, let's have it for the word "printing" instead. hehe

   Ed, what would be really cool is an implementation of IdeaJam on DevWorks or PartnerWorld, where IBM could authenticate the votes. Then it would be relatively trivial to tie those customer license counts and such.

   I have to remember to make sure I email this article to Bruce, no matter what: { Link }

1. 12  Henning Heinz  | 10/19/2007 6:42:57 AM

   No problem if a top voted feature does not make it into a next release (I am used to that anyway) but I sometimes would really welcome more information why something does not happen. One reason why I really like the weblog of Andre Guirard.

   For the IdeaJam website. Good work and good luck that the product behind IdeaJam is going to sell well.

1. 13  Ben Langhinrichs http://www.GeniiSoft.com/showcase.nsf/GeniiBlog | 10/19/2007 6:53:32 AM

   I also want to point out an alternative benefit that doesn't seem to be mentioned much. Idea Jam could be a treasure trove for those ISVs who want ideas on what people want that IBM might NOT implement. And that isn't a bad thing, because a thriving add-on market is critical to the health of an ecosystem such as Notes. Perhaps IBM rightly feels that it is not worth implementing Feature X, but there is still significant demand for Feature X. ISV Y might decide it is worth meeting that demand, because due to a much smaller size and smaller installed base, they have the freedom and flexibility to implement such a feature. This is good for the customers who have a solution (obviously there are features where this is more relevant than others), it is good for ISV Y because they have a product that sells, and it is good for IBM because their customers have a solution without it clouding the general product too much.

   Just another reason why a rabid capitalist such as myself likes the idea.

1. 14  Julian Robichaux http://www.nsftools.com | 10/19/2007 7:00:31 AM

   I think it's a glass is half full/half empty sort of thing. We all know that every single idea won't be implemented by IBM. We can either take it to mean that IBM is NOT listening to the ideas, or that they ARE listening. I'm a half-full person myself. If there are a few good ideas that do end up in the product that wouldn't have otherwise, I think that's a win.

   Also, as Tim mentioned above, these are not just ideas for IBM, they are also ideas for business partners. It could be great for the BP community to watch the IdeaJam boards and develop interesting new products. Or point to products that are already available.

1. 15  Julian Robichaux http://www.nsftools.com | 10/19/2007 7:01:54 AM

   Oh yeah, what Ben said. I think we were typing our comments at the same time. ;-)

1. 16  Kevin Mort  | 10/19/2007 7:07:13 AM

   There are many very valid comments here in terms of being involved in the Lotus community. In fact they play out in communities of all sorts, virtual and actual.

   The truth is that the pseudo-backlash which stems from Lotus not implementing some feature plays out in the developerWorks forums, from Meet the Developers at Lotusphere and so on.

   We've dealt with this in the System i space for years when folks comment at the COMMON Town Hall sessions or on Midrange-L.

   Anywhere you get a group of individuals together who are passionate about that which they speak, you have this situation.

   Ben has an excellent point as to ISV opportunities to fill the gaps so to speak. And of course what could happen is that said ISV develops a product around that idea to have IBM then turn around and buy it.

   One thing though on social networking websites in general that I noticed yesterday. One must be rather specific in what sites they participate in, else risk not paying adequate attention to any. Between keeping up with various blogs, forums, LinkedIn and now someone wants me to join Facebook among other things...I think it can get to be too much.

1. 17  Keith Brooks http://lotus.tech.blogspot.com | 10/19/2007 7:47:57 AM

   As I wrote in my note to Bruce it's for better or worse but at least everyone who is not lucky enough to be a BP or megacompany that gets invited to the preview of Rnext gets to provide some feedback in a place where others can identify with it.

   For years Lotus has been holding the sessons with the key clients a few non-US ones even.But as Ed pointed out the non-US clients do need a place too. The problem of course is someone has to translate the requests and the laziness factor sets in.

   Translation on the fly in Domino would be a nice add in task :-)

1. 18  Henry Ferlauto http://www.geniusinside.com | 10/19/2007 8:34:47 AM

   One would think that all of IBM's software groups would embrace this sort of technology, especially Lotus since they are the group responsible for beating the social networking drum. And by embrace I mean having like functionality on their own website(s). Whether that's using IdeaJam directly, private labeled; or developing like functionality in house.

   IBM would hardly be the first software company to do this.

   Salesforce.com involves their customer base with their "IdeaExchange" website - { Link }

   In the Lotus world, the technology that Bruce has developed as well as others is exactly what people like Mary Beth Raven need.

   While IBM has given the world countless great innovations, no one person or group can lay claim to being the sole source of ideas on any subject.

   This type of technology simply increases the diversity of ideas; and just like a good financial portfolio, diversity is fundamental to long term viability. And in the software business, ideas are indeed a form of currency.

1. 19  Henry Ferlauto http://www.geniusinside.com | 10/19/2007 9:03:59 AM

   Addenda... Lotus should actually have idea management software like this in its own portfolio of products.

   It's the next evolution of the blog in a sense. The difference is the initial content can come from anywhere, not just the host or moderator.

   The other big news is that we are now in the infancy stages of starting to weight opinion. Today a simple thumbs up or thumbs down per se. Tomorrow? Who knows? But the Bruce Elgorts of the world will take us there.

1. 20  Ed Brill http://www.edbrill.com | 10/19/2007 9:30:02 AM

   @17 Keith, just to clarify, we do not only invite "megacompanies" to software design reviews. Some of the most successful contributors to SDRs have been representing small organizations.

1. 21  Paul Tran  | 10/19/2007 1:04:15 PM

   IdeaJam looks a lot like BrightIdea's also has WebStorm. Is IdeaJam built all on IBM technology?

1. 22  Bruce Elgort http://ideas.elguji.com | 10/19/2007 1:25:22 PM

   @21,

   The IdeaJam was built on IBM Lotus Domino 8.0 using Lotus Domino Designer, Yahoo YUI and MooTools.

1. 23  Mika Heinonen http://www.siipi.com/mika | 10/19/2007 6:44:07 PM

   Domino 8 rocks. I don't know what some Yahoo and Moo could add. Web 2.0 seems like the most idiotic idea ever, you GET everyhing (like in WebServices), asking for updates every second? Instead of that the host PUTs you the updated info when its really changed. The bandwidth saving is enormous if you just push the changes, compared to that a million users ask if something has changed every second.

1. 24  Ben Poole http://benpoole.com | 10/20/2007 2:55:01 AM

   Yeah, all those Web 2.0 sites arre really suffering eh Mika? I've been starting to wonder what you're on lately ;o)

1. 25  Carl Tyler http://www.iminstant.com | 10/20/2007 7:43:56 PM

   @24 I was thinking the same thing. Also if the sites are well written, they aren't continually updating every second.

1. 26  Nathan T. Freeman http://nathan.lotus911.com | 10/21/2007 8:42:14 AM

   @23 - Are you suggesting that there's some mechanism whereby the Domino server can conduct an HTTP PUT operation to broadcast updates to web clients? And that AJAXy browsers can process external PUT operations, which would necessitate a local running web server listening on a port?

1. 27  Tim Tripcony http://www.timtripcony.com | 10/21/2007 11:20:46 AM

   @26 - The closest I've seen to this is, ironically, an approach where the browser does in fact maintain a persistent connection (bad idea, of course), so when the content changes it knows "immediately". The most frequently I've ever set AJAX to query is every 5 seconds, and that was in the context of a web-based IM client ("Marco", out on OpenNTF, for the curious). In typical applications, requests are only sent in direct response to user interaction: submitting form data, marking documents as read/unread, etc.

   @23 - When used appropriately, AJAX can actually *reduce* bandwidth consumption and server load:

   { Link }

   I don't think a trend toward increased interactivity in web applications is a mistake; I think the mistake was to call that trend "Web 2.0"... we all know .0 versions tend to be buggy... ;)

1. 28  Christopher Byrne http://www.controlscaddy.com/ | 10/21/2007 11:05:17 PM

   @23 - Did you not on your blog write that Notes 8 sucks? : { Link }

1. 29  Axel  | 10/22/2007 3:23:17 AM

   Afaik the jetty server supports http push from a server. Server needs to support big number of concurrent connections and continuations to make this an option.

1. 30  Henning Heinz  | 10/22/2007 7:48:38 AM

   Although I think it is valid to differentiate between Notes 8 and Domino 8. I do agree with Ben in @24. A bit strange lately.

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