Notes on Productivity Home Page

I'm pleased to see that Michael Sampson has joined the conversation started by Carl and Graham about CMS Watch on SharePoint. I'm also pleased that Michael sets a few things straight about Lotus Notes.

I may get cranky  from time to time about the marketing perception of Lotus Notes, it's only because I'm passionate about the Lotus Brand and I want the world to know what people are doing with Lotus software today. I have been working with, selling, and integrating enterprise solutions based on Lotus products since before Lotus Notes came on the scene 20 years ago. Further, I  like many other Lotus Business Partners are making significant investment in building solutions around the Lotus Platform. We do this because Lotus works and because customers are solving business problems with Lotus applications. I have lots of respect and praise for Lotus Notes, and despite articles like the now retracted CMS Watch post on the difference between SharePoint and Notes, Lotus Notes isn't going away and IBM's not phasing it out. If anything, Lotus Notes is getting stronger.

With Notes 8.5.1 IBM has delivered on its promise to deliver a fully functional cross-platform eclipse-based implementation of Notes that will become the foundation for the next generation of Notes applications. I believe this, combined with the new push in Lotus marketing, will help convince the world that the next 20 years of Lotus Notes are likely to be even stronger than the first.

I'm getting ready for our first major snow storm of the season, so not much time for blogging today. I'll try to post more thoughts this week. Meanwhile, Michael's post is a worthwhile read, as is Ed's tribute to the first 20 years of Lotus Notes.