My take on the Lotus Redbook controversy...
Category IBM/Lotus
Many have talked about the decision to phase out the Lotus Redbook residencies. I know that I have benefitted from Redbooks over the years. It used to be that there was a mad dash at Lotusphere to get the actual bound copy of the "must have" title. Then it was the mad dash to get the CDs that had a collection of the hot titles. Now I just find myself going out to the Redbook site to download what I need when I need it. But I'm still old-school... the first thing I do is print it out. :)
If given my choice, of course I'd like to see them continue to be produced. But as any tech publisher will tell you, tech book sales aren't a booming business any more. It's a lot of cost and risk for what could be a significant loss. In IBM's case, it's a lot of cost for *no* monetary payback, as the books are free. Yes, I know the intangibles of developer education, good will, etc. I'm simply saying it's a significant cost to bring in experts for a residency with no financial return on investment.
Are there alternative models for doing the same type of things that the redbooks accomplish? Yes. Will they work, be adopted, and flourish? Maybe, maybe not...
Think about a Lotus wikipedia-style site. Let users contribute to the knowledgebase, add documentation, give practical details on software, etc. The experts that contributed during a residency would still be able to contribute here, just not with all the technical support that IBM provided onsite. I could pretty much guarantee that cryptic error messages that have plagued Notes users for years would be much better covered using this type of "publishing" than anything else that's existed to date.
Think about self-publishing... Chris Miller did it with the Sametime Gateway software. It used to be that going the "vanity press" route meant a significant investment of your own money to get the book created. Now with print-on-demand, nearly anyone can write a book on a subject, publish it on POD sites (or even Amazon if you're so inclined), and there's no major outlay of cash to pull it off. With all the bloggers we have in the Notes community, you can't tell me that we couldn't publish 6 to 12 focused titles a year on various aspects of Lotus technology. Even the major bugaboo of self-published titles, the lack of decent editing prior to publishing, could be handled with peer review in this community. If bloggers can do one thing right, it's review technical information and offer opinions. :)
And it's not even necessary to write a "book" any more. O'Reilly has their Shortcuts series, which are PDF files between 50 to 100 pages for prices under $10. The investment on their part is significantly less than going to press with a full book, and niche subjects can be covered in more depth than a single chapter in a book. Imagine what might happen if a number of the writers in our community started pitching Notes titles to O'Reilly for short cut offerings. That approach starts to overcome the "you don't see Notes titles in the bookstores any more" argument. It also makes the process of sharing your knowledge profitable without forcing people to plunk down $60 for a book.
I realize this goes against the prevailing "the sky is falling" attitude surrounding the Redbook decision. I'm not thrilled with it myself. But instead of only complaining about the decision by IBM, think about what alternatives might work and be successful to the larger Notes community. If something like a Lotus wiki started up or a tech publisher started to carry a Notes line of titles, then I might even venture to say that the lemons that were handed to us made a great lemonade and lemon meringue pie...
Many have talked about the decision to phase out the Lotus Redbook residencies. I know that I have benefitted from Redbooks over the years. It used to be that there was a mad dash at Lotusphere to get the actual bound copy of the "must have" title. Then it was the mad dash to get the CDs that had a collection of the hot titles. Now I just find myself going out to the Redbook site to download what I need when I need it. But I'm still old-school... the first thing I do is print it out. :)
If given my choice, of course I'd like to see them continue to be produced. But as any tech publisher will tell you, tech book sales aren't a booming business any more. It's a lot of cost and risk for what could be a significant loss. In IBM's case, it's a lot of cost for *no* monetary payback, as the books are free. Yes, I know the intangibles of developer education, good will, etc. I'm simply saying it's a significant cost to bring in experts for a residency with no financial return on investment.
Are there alternative models for doing the same type of things that the redbooks accomplish? Yes. Will they work, be adopted, and flourish? Maybe, maybe not...
Think about a Lotus wikipedia-style site. Let users contribute to the knowledgebase, add documentation, give practical details on software, etc. The experts that contributed during a residency would still be able to contribute here, just not with all the technical support that IBM provided onsite. I could pretty much guarantee that cryptic error messages that have plagued Notes users for years would be much better covered using this type of "publishing" than anything else that's existed to date.
Think about self-publishing... Chris Miller did it with the Sametime Gateway software. It used to be that going the "vanity press" route meant a significant investment of your own money to get the book created. Now with print-on-demand, nearly anyone can write a book on a subject, publish it on POD sites (or even Amazon if you're so inclined), and there's no major outlay of cash to pull it off. With all the bloggers we have in the Notes community, you can't tell me that we couldn't publish 6 to 12 focused titles a year on various aspects of Lotus technology. Even the major bugaboo of self-published titles, the lack of decent editing prior to publishing, could be handled with peer review in this community. If bloggers can do one thing right, it's review technical information and offer opinions. :)
And it's not even necessary to write a "book" any more. O'Reilly has their Shortcuts series, which are PDF files between 50 to 100 pages for prices under $10. The investment on their part is significantly less than going to press with a full book, and niche subjects can be covered in more depth than a single chapter in a book. Imagine what might happen if a number of the writers in our community started pitching Notes titles to O'Reilly for short cut offerings. That approach starts to overcome the "you don't see Notes titles in the bookstores any more" argument. It also makes the process of sharing your knowledge profitable without forcing people to plunk down $60 for a book.
I realize this goes against the prevailing "the sky is falling" attitude surrounding the Redbook decision. I'm not thrilled with it myself. But instead of only complaining about the decision by IBM, think about what alternatives might work and be successful to the larger Notes community. If something like a Lotus wiki started up or a tech publisher started to carry a Notes line of titles, then I might even venture to say that the lemons that were handed to us made a great lemonade and lemon meringue pie...
Comments
Posted by Christopher Byrne At 16:53:08 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
I do not agree with you about the high cost for no monetary payback, this should be seen as a marketing expense.
The all thing does not add up, IBM is investing heavily in bring new clients to Notes\Domino, some of them might not have any knowledge about the Lotus portfolio and once they start looking around they will read blog posts of people complaining about IBM taking away one of their most valuable resources. To say the least this is bad timing.
Posted by Vitor Pereira At 14:35:24 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
* cough *
Posted by Ben Poole At 09:50:24 On 27/09/2007 | - Website - |
Good post Tom, thanks. The O’Reilly idea intrigues me…
Posted by Ben Poole At 12:58:29 On 25/09/2007 | - Website - |
Correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding was that this was leaked. So for all any of us know, there IS a replacement under way, but the person who leaked it doesn't know about that part.
If I'm wrong, and there's some official statement to the contrary, please point me there.
Posted by Nathan T. Freeman At 10:48:42 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
@9: I think you give bloggers too much credit. I'd venture to say that the vast majority of Lotus professionals don't read blogs nearly as much as we do. And outside of that community, we're a very small voice in a very big ocean. Potential customers *might* be inclined to stumble onto Ed's blog, but I doubt they're going to have the 10 blogs discussing this item flagged as a major criteria for purchasing.
And it's not as if IBM said they are going to completely quit documenting Notes/Domino software. There are still DeveloperWorks articles, tech notes, etc. And do you truly believe that come Notes/Domino 9.0, there won't be any attempt to put out some documentation on migrating from 8 to 9? Perhaps a redpiece, perhaps some form of documentation we haven't seen yet.
Yes, it appears that redbooks *as they currently exist and the format that they currently are produced in* are changing. Do I think it's the best decision *from what information I have*? No. But IBM doesn't answer to me, and I'm not privy to the background on these types of decision. Time will tell as to whether this was the start of something new and better, or the end of a critical source of information.
My guess is it will be somewhere between those two extremes...
Posted by Duffbert At 17:20:40 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Bruce Elgort At 18:29:00 On 22/09/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Barry in Portland At 08:05:28 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Vitor Pereira At 02:08:41 On 24/09/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Duffbert At 14:01:34 On 25/09/2007 | - Website - |
One thing to note, and many comments/blogs have missed this, this is not the end to Lotus Redbooks, it is the end to the Lotus redbook center, which means if IBM does involve customers in building Lotus Redbooks, they will be built in somewhere like Poughkeepsie where there is very little Lotus skills. However there are no more Lotus redbooks this year, and from what I hear no redbook booth at LS.
Posted by Carl Tyler At 04:00:36 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
Spot on. I agree with the suggestion that something good may come out of this farce, but the way this is being handled if it happens it will be despite IBM and not because of them. Which is a shame.
But if IBM, even now, were to constructively engage with the wider Lotus community, accounce the shiny new wiki.lotus.com site, and pre-populate that site with the existing redbooks content as a parting gift, then the cloud may turn out to have a silver lining. At the moment, it's just a cloud...
Posted by Julian Woodward At 00:24:11 On 23/09/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Bruce Elgort At 18:50:07 On 22/09/2007 | - Website - |
Posted by Bruce Elgort At 18:50:08 On 22/09/2007 | - Website - |
I personally think that a wiki, similar in style and design to the Domino Designer help files, would have to be a Lotus domain site. Not to say that a non-Lotus site couldn't pull it off, but going out to IBM.com (or lotus.com) to get to the wiki seems much more natural for people looking for answers.
And I know this has been proposed before and gone nowhere. I'm not offering a fleshed-out solution here. Just imagining "what if".
Posted by Duffbert At 18:41:55 On 22/09/2007 | - Website - |