[australia] Why home grown CMS?

[Melanie Kendell]

Hi James

Welcome to the group :)

I'm going to answer your points in a slightly different order.

> A CM tool that "digs" for information from many feeds and then shows this
> information via their relationship would provide a means for the user to
> "pan" for more information and make use of it more readily.

A CM tool (or any other software tool for that matter) is a passive
creature and does not dig.

I agree with you that the relationships in information are the
motherlode but it takes a human (information architect - whether
that's their job title or not) to build the architecture (the mine
infrastructure) to expose the relationships.

> Information is like gold and it's buried under dirt, that's why organisation
> don't see the value in their information.

Again it takes a human (writer) to cut trhough the dross (not all
content is equal) and make sure you're left with only the pure metal.

> Their are rich veins of information that flow beneath the surface of all
> organisations but most of the CM's I have seen don't do more than
> make a pretty display of some very simple information and leave a
> lot to be desired in terms of showing the relationships between
> different information. It's these relationships that "mean" value in
> the minds of the users.

This is because most organisations see their goldfield as somewhere
that they just dump the soil and everyone has to go picking through it
to find the occasional nugget of information, rather than investing in
a proper mining and refining processes.

> If you found real gold then you associate that with money, the association
> is what makes the find valuable.

The gold is there but it takes effort to make it into a form that
gives it that bling factor. Most organisations are not prepared to put
in that effort (ie cash).

> A CM tool that doesn't do this in some way appears to me to be little more
> than a fancy way to post web pages. Of course there is a place for this too, but
> it's not going to cause the gold rush some want to happen.

Once you've been around here for a while you'll see that I kind of
agree with you - I see WCMS as a specific form of CMS - a true CMS
wouldn't be limited to one type of publishing media.

But the most important thing is that organisations need to invest in
their information before they can reap the rewards of one of their
most important assets.(Its kind of like the old chestnut "our people
are our most important asset" - how many organisations walk the talk
on that one?!)

> I'm still looking for the gold.

So am I :)

-Melanie