RSS feedsOf course, Web-based products had been available for a while but these had mainly been existing DOS or Windows online or CD-ROM products, ported over to a new delivery platform, with a handful of enhanced searching capabilities tacked on. Vendors willing to take the considerable risk of developing almost from scratch new Web-based products have found an eager market. Two stand out -- OneSource and Dow Jones.
OneSource took a major commercial risk in winding down its CD-ROM business and investing its energies in its Business Browser suite. UK Business Browser was launched at Online Information 97. Ernst & Young was the first firm to take up an enterprise-wide licence in the UK and we have now successfully deployed this integrated company financial data and research product across the firm.
Dow Jones launched its Interactive product (DJI) at about the same time and, although it is still predominantly US-focused, DJI is making important advances in the European marketplace. Dow Jones also decided to abandon its traditional platforms in order to focus entirely on a Web product aimed at both information professionals and end-users. Not content with simply creating a Web version of existing products, Dow Jones practically rebuilt Dow Jones News/Retrieval from the ground up. The results are impressive and the continuous stream of enhancements shows the benefits of highly focused product development.
Both these vendors understood the increasing demand from organisations for enterprise-wide, flat-fee, unlimited access pricing deals, in place of 'per seat/site' or 'number of concurrent users' or 'pay-as-you-go' or 'per article' models.
This brings me onto my biggest bugbear of the year. Many content owners who publish electronically, particularly those who publish premium market research and analysis reports, have still not woken up to the impact of knowledge management on how content is being deployed within organisations. Global intranets are being deployed, encouraging virtually effortless knowledge sharing not only between departments but between different countries and, in some instances, organisations. Until content owners and publishers realise that their content must be used, reproduced, distributed, displayed, stored and made into derivative works on a global basis at realistic prices, both parties will continue to lose out.
The motto for 1999 must be 'less mutton dressed as lamb' with regard to Web-based products. Also, publishers, please remember that we're all part of a new information revolution with unlimited potential -- don't hinder it!
Julian Hope is a Senior Manager responsible for Knowledge Services in Ernst & Young's UK Centre for Business Knowledge.
