The Dangers of a Disorderly Market (cont'd)

It'll Take More Than a Village
The onus is on the OSS vendor community to enforce some maturity, have more integrity and communicate its true capabilities more clearly to its customers. Today, there is no watchdog organization or any kind of neutral body to deal with these market issues. The TeleManagement Forum is perhaps the only organizational body dedicated to OSS, but it deals largely with technical standards and does not have the resources, or the directive, to police the vendor community. There are no "Consumer Reports" for OSS products on which carriers can rely. There are no published pricing lists based on actual contracts, rather than on vendor marketing.

Further, the groups that would in theory bring these control factors to the industry - consultants, analysts, and the media - are unable to do so for various reasons. Consultants and systems integrators are beholden to their channel partners and thus rarely make neutral recommendations to carriers. Analysts are carefully neutral in order to serve some of the carriers' interests while not also offending their valuable OSS vendor customers. Most members of the media are simply denied information on topics like pricing, and the tangible results of OSS projects. Hence, even OSS vendor success stories - and there are actually many - are almost never made public. Ultimately, however, the responsibility falls on vendors to be forthright about their capabilities and practical with their promises. If OSS vendors do come together to raise their integrity and promote order, it will be the primary reason the OSS sector realizes its apparent upside.

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