> Based on my 30 years in library technology, that statement doesn't ring true to me. My experience was that signing an NDA was the exception rather than the rule. NDAs only seemed to come into play when a vendor was letting you in on inside information...looking at source code, hearing detailed design info for a new product, etc....proprietary information they did not want their competitors getting hold of.
>
Precisely -- those who actually know what they're talking about can't
say anything. General design, data structures, communication, and
other details give you the whats and whys that let you accurately
predict what will happen at implementation time in your local
production environment. Otherwise, we essentially base our decisions
on sales literature.
Finding libraries that bought products and never used them because
decisionmakers were unaware of some critical detail before purchase is
like shooting fish in a barrel. Information doesn't have to be
formally shared to be secret -- reverse engineering clauses in
contracts limit your ability to learn through inference and analysis.
We live in a world where we absolutely must get services produced by
different entities to work together. When we must work blind and
cannot conduct open and honest discussions about real details, it
holds our services back. Then people say we suck, go elsewhere to
fulfill their information needs, and everyone suffers.
kyle
Received on Wed Mar 04 2009 - 14:48:47 EST