You may have seen some of the comments to Steve Stockstill’s guest post concerning Time Matters Mobility. Friday, Mark Deal posted a monster response to Steve (it was over twice as long as the original post).
The underlying message of his post is that you should trust LexisNexis to do the right thing. Thus Mark “assumes” once, “believes” twice, “imagines” twice and “expects” once. Mobility is twice labeled a “first step” and once more grandiloquently a “vision toward the future.”
Over the last several years LexisNexis’ assurances have remained unfulfilled repeatedly. Even Mark notes that whereas he assumed that LN would “improve their tool based on their own customer feedback,” “this has not been the case, LexisNexis has not improved on their solution.”
This is at least in part due to the pressure of yearly releases: they have to bring out “new” features, so they bring out something that is half-baked and then never actually fix it. This is fairly common among companies who have gone over to yearly updates. Remember Desktop Extensions.
Mark parrots LexisNexis’ assertion that Time Matters 11 Service Release 1 is “coming soon” to provide calendar functionality in TM Mobility. Let’s see, TM 11 has not actually been released yet (it is in the final stages of beta testing), but Service Release 1 is “coming soon.” Gimme a break.
Microsoft is notorious for buying up companies in order to acquire their technology. Surely it would have made much more sense for LexisNexis to purchase or license superior products such as Mobile TM or TMTools rather than develop their own inferior functionality?
One of Steve’s criticisms was that TM Mobility would be cut off if you drop your annual maintenance to Time Matters. Mark defends this as common to the SaaS model: it is by subscription, if you drop the subscription you don’t get the service. This would be logical except for the fact that LexisNexis has loudly trumpeted the “fact” that TM Mobility is “free.” Obviously it is not free, it only comes with the Annual Maintenance Plan. You can’t have it both ways.
It is worth recalling Ronald Reagan’s famous “trust, but verify” comment. When verification fails – as it has systematically for virtually all LexisNexis’ assertions of the type “we are aware of problems, we are working on it” over the past several years – trust is eroded. This is what has happened with Time Matters. It is no longer rational to assume, believe, or imagine.
This is a great blog. I came on to TM in 2000 because of Bob Butler's personal touch. I liked the fact that in 2000, he spoke of his vision of TM, intregation with email, timelines, outlines and such, and they all came about.
Having TM work on smart phones can't be that hard. I can do it now through remote desktop but I want something scaleable. I have not seen any improvement in TM since around version 7.
Just had version 11 installed. I don't see anything new or improved. It's the same as v.10. IN fact, since v.9 the lists under my contacts are all screwed up. For me, I would prefer to go back to v 7 or 8.
Posted by: Terry Napora | July 21, 2011 at 03:49 PM
yes this is the message when it fails "we are aware of problems, we are working on it"
Posted by: Online Education | July 19, 2011 at 02:01 AM
Having waited faithfully for TM 11 for the purpose of using the grand "mobility", it is a stinker. Calendar is not a function, and the little interaction with Matters and Contacts (wow..I can read and edit a memo"..thanks guys) was a disappointment. GotomyPC of logmein is the only way to be truly mobile and without the annual maintenance ripoff... Time Matters is out of touch.
Posted by: Sean | June 21, 2011 at 08:49 AM
Technology really brought a wide range of effect to human. With the advancement of technology, people can do whatever they want. With the use of the technology products, people now are at ease and use everything to be comfortable.
Posted by: iPhone 4 case | April 03, 2011 at 12:12 AM
I'm not sure why this comment to my comment was not posted as a comment linked to my comment, but the link to the original commentary can be found here:
http://doesitcompute.typepad.com/heckman/2011/03/guest-blog-steve-stockstill-on-time-matters-mobility.html
I welcome your comments and an open and honest dialog.
Posted by: Mark A. Deal | March 21, 2011 at 10:44 AM