Riding the open standards wave to lower costs

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Ask yourself: Why does IBM love open standards?

That's a question I don't think most people undestand the real answer to.

And IMO, the real answer is that IBM loves open standards because they are so well positioned to leverage them. They've got more clout than anybody, and since their late-'90s restructurings they're capable of moving with great speed and agility (like Geertz's metaphorical octopus) to bring all their absurdly vast resources to bear on a problem -- if there's enough money involved.

Going into a deal, IBM in 2003 is positioned to offer a client a solution for just about any problem the client can pose. If they don't make it, they can broker it (witness their shift from favoring OS/2 to favoring Windows for servers and desktops). They can sell you hardware running the OS family of your choice, software for that OS, consulting for the software, and development for software you don't have yet.

All of this can happen because IBM is united behind purpose, not a person. They're all there to further IBM. (Not even necessarily to make money -- though that's usually what it would be.) Part of the genius of Lou Gerstner (the great forgotten "savior CEO") was that he was, in a sense, forgettable. IBM in the Gerstner era was always about IBM, not about Lou Gerstner.

Conversely, MS dislikes ("hates" is too strong) open standards because they have a relatively narrow technology base and a top-down management culture. Even in the Post-Gates "Ballmer Era", MS is all about the Men at the top, and their vision and their "innovations". People of vision (like Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, or Dean Kamen) often have little tolerance for visions of the Way Things Are that don't match their own.

Now, I don't write this to praise IBM or damn MS, though there will be plenty who will read it either way. These are simply observations. IBM, if they didn't see it as in their interest to back open standards, would do their level best to smother them in the crib. Anybody who's been in this industry over about 10 years should know that quite well.

And that's more or less my point: While I think open standards are *great* from a little guy's perspective, let's not forget why our big "allies" are in the game. They're not in it for us -- they're in it for them. They don't care what we think, except insofar as we influence the thinking in the companies we work for. And, the Cluetrain notwithstanding, that's probably not much.

Posted by: escoles@...   Posted on: 10/17/03 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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