Friday 4 March 2005

Shock and horror: more about Oracle and Forrester!

James found this great document in his blog from today: "We Are Not Influenced By Vendors".
This looks like another call to regulate the IT analysts, as put in the Investor's Business Daily a "dirty little secret" about "cozy relationships".
The paper, having dug some emails from the PeopleSoft vs. Oracle suit, raises two points:

  • The fact analysts submits papers to vendors for factual review. Frankly, this should be considered as best practice! If only journalists were asked to check their facts....
  • It also questions whether vendors should have the right to select which analyst they talk to. This begs for a questioning on the nature of the relationship. On one side, vendors are disclosing information to analysts and maybe they should treat them equally. But as we know, the best conversations happen at the bar. Should then AR get a bigger entertainment budget to fund larger rounds? (I would not be against)
    On the other side, well established AR departments should fence what is disclosed and operate a fair policy to not go beyond what's "publicly" available facts and offer additional commentaries.

Easier said than done, though....

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