However, no software system is perfect, and issues do sometimes arise. Unfortunately, this creates a complicated situation in our case because the end users of our partners do not always know that the issue is with the FlatBurger technology, so they logically go to either the developer of the application, hosting provider, or the place the got the product from. This results in potential increased support burden on our partners, which we again consider absolutely unacceptable.

To mitigate this issue, we have attempted to communicate to end users in as many ways as possible instructions on how to use the licensing technology as well as any critical known issues. We have invested in creating a detailed online knowledge base and full support system, which we promote and offer for anyone to come to for support. However, again, that is sometimes missed, and as a result, support requests and forum posts are occasionally created in our partners systems.

To assist with this, and to extend our support reach beyond the realm of our own support site and system, we have setup a series of google alerts that constantly monitor all available web content for any possible error associated with the FlatBurger system. As soon as Google finds a support issue, post in a forum , etc., from an end user asking for help due to an issue that might be somehow related to our technology, our support team is immediately notified and able to respond in a quick and efficient manner. As a result, we are often able to respond to an issue even before our partner is. Yay Google and yay technology!

We are very much trying to fine tune our product and address any issues that arise as soon as possible. Identifying and diagnosing those issues is the first critical step in making that happen, and we are making considerable efforts in that regard. If anyone encounters any sort of issue that might be associated with our technology, I ask you to please visit support.flatburger.com. As we discover issues, we have been creating local accounts in all of your support systems (ie. Username = FlatBurgerSupport) to attempt to address all issues directly within your current support system for your users.

While Google is good, it can’t compete with automated immediate notification systems built directly into a partners support system / forums, so I do encourage all partners that are notified of an issue, to notify us via support.flatburger.com as soon as soon as you receive that notification so we can get a jump on the issue. Additionally, we have created a new email address for partners to directly forward issues to at FBSupport@flatburger.com. Any email sent here will go both to our entire support staff, as well as myself.

eBay has done a great job of leveling, or ‘flattening’ the playing field to allow all merchants to compete on an equal footing. They provide a simple place for merchants to go where their success is based on the value of the products they can provide relative to the cost they provide them at. They also provide a simple place to go for consumers to find whatever ‘it’ is they are looking for to fulfill their unique wants and needs. Commerce can’t get much easier than that. Or can it?

As our world economy advances, more and more new types of things are being traded by people online every day. Note that I say ‘trade’ in this case, and not ‘commerce’ as I did with eBay, and that I say ‘people’, not ‘merchants’. Trade happens when two people(s) have something that the other person(s) need or want. While in the commercial part of the world, one of those things is generally money, the definition of a marketplace online expands to include “any sphere considered as a place where ideas, thoughts, artistic creations, etc., compete for recognition.” ²

Without getting too philisophical here and saying that this blog itself is a marketplace where ideas and thoughts are being traded in exchange for your time and feedback, I do want to talk about one category of idea / thought / artistic creation that I work a lot with, which is computer software. Whether is open source, closed source, or some combination of the two, millions of software applications are traded every day. Some are traded in exchange for:

• Potential for money
• Potential for selling services and support for it
• Potential for person to click on an advertisement
• Potential for collecting usage or personal information
• Potential for ego boosting or reputation building
• Personal satisfaction

I say potential for many of the above exchanged commodities due to the fact that software can be easily copied and is thus often traded void of any of them, as in piracy; legal, moral or otherwise. While one of its’ greatest weaknesses, this ‘non-rivilrous’ nature of software applications is also one of its’ biggest strengths. Software is a virtual commodity. Unlike the majority of products sold on eBay, it does not suffer from the drawback of having to ship it anywhere. Instead, it can be downloaded, installed and used almost instantly. A great potential and need for a different type of marketplace exists as a result.

While software is used to cater to long tail markets, why is it that software itself has yet to really capitalize on the potential hundreds of thousands of unique vertical needs out there? The technology exists to do it. I would be willing to bet that for every single vertical need out there, someone has already written a piece of software to fill that need. Why then are so many millions of end users not having their needs met yet? I think it’s because it’s too hard to make sense of it all. I consider this tragic because there are so many opportunities to make peoples lives easier and accomplish more in less time through the use of software designed specifically to fill an individuals unique needs.

If I have a particular software need right now, there is no real efficient mechanism for me to find that unique application. If I am lucky enough to wade through the millions of search results in Google and find something that might be useful to me, I have very little basis on which to make a decision as to whether or not that application is going to fill my needs. Is this company trustworthy? Are they going to abuse or improperly manage my credit card information? Are they going to install a virus or spyware on my computer? Are they going to support the product if I need help? Does the application even work as advertised, or at all?

The Internet enables someone in their basement to appear as professional as a large multi-national company. That is not the problem, as I have purchased and used many software applications from basement dwellers that are more professional and provide better product and service than companies 100 times their size. In fact, it is the smaller companies that focus on filling a specific need that are the key to this long tail of software users. The problem is, large or small, free or paid for, there is no easy way for someone to guage the quality of many applications or the creators of them. There is no way for a user to easily decide whether or not it is worth trading their time and / or money to acquire and use an application. Add to that the general complexities of Installation, Upgrading, License Management, EULA’s, Open Source, Closed Source, etc. and you see why it’s enough to make a seasoned software engineer want to cry, let alone a general end user.

Putting all of those things together and you can start to see why current attempts at creating software marketplaces have not been as successul as they could be. When it comes to software, I have a fundamental problem with the word market’place’ altogether. My ideas, thoughts, artistic ability, and money, are all ‘here’, with me. Why do I have to ‘go’ to some other ‘place’ to exchange them with someone? People talk about these general concepts of Web 2.0 and making internet software more personalized, but I think these things need to happen to the actual process of creating and trading software itself as well.

Trade happens between two people or groups. While a trade might be brokered by some third party or technology, there should not be the need to go outside of my current workspace to acquire an application to fill my needs. Whatever platform I am currently using (Windows, Sharepoint, DotNetNuke, etc.) should allow me to easily find applications to plug into that platform. It should then give me information in a common format to easily understand what the application does and what I need to do to use it. It should allow me to quickly determine whether I can trust an application or application developer, large or small. It should provide the tools required to facilitate communication and trade between creator and user, buyer and seller.

The ability to connect those who need something with those who can provide it is the key to any marketplace. When this ‘flat’ software marketplace comes to be, it will open up the opportunity for an application developer to focus on a particular vertical niche in an economical way, and provide high value for low cost. I would predict an explosion of both software creation and use because of this. This will be driven by the ever increasing world wide pool of talented developers being able to focus doing what they do best, developing. It will matter much less the size of the company or the size of the marketing budget, rather what will determine the success of a company or an individual is their ability to identify user needs and create quality software applications that fill those needs.

http://www.ronjacobs.com/lwcs/Flatburger.htm

http://www.blogger.com/ResourceCenter/Blogs/tabid/5576/EntryID/224/Default.aspx

As Bill said, as a result of us working with many partners, we have seen first hand the demand for the creation or improvement of certain modules. Take this Blog module for instance. Hans-Peter Schelian (www.schelian.com), the creator of this module, has done an amazing job, and on top of that, he has been generous enough to give it away for free! He has done this for several other modules as well, and is a true role model for open source development. We use the module, and certainly appreciate it.

That said, however, we have heard many customers and partners ask for something better. While this blog module is quite functional, it does not compete well with popular blogs out there such as TypePad or Blogger. We have actually had partners tell us that they have had potential customers not accept a DNN solution as a whole because of this lacking functionality.

To fill this need, a module developer will need to focus on making a blog that can compete with the best of the best blogs out there. Doing so would create a module that people would not only be willing to pay for, but also grow the number of people willing to use DNN as a solution to fill their needs. Too often module developers develop a large suite of modules, but do none of them particularly well. Even if they do develop the best DNN module for that particular category, little happens to advance the cause of DNN as a whole. DNN does not advance as a whole until each module is competitive with the best applications in their category outside of DNN.

Each person or company only has so many hours in a day. Most of the DNN module developers I talk to know this all to well. The key here is to focus your energy on a single module, and do it very well. FOCUS! FOCUS! FOCUS! It is because of the need for focus that we will never create modules to sell ourselves. Doing so would detract from our ability to focus on providing the services and support to the community, which is the core of our business. Because we are focused on that, any module we would create to give or sell to the consumer would be lacking, and would ultimately not really be worth the effort. It would also compete directly with the community we are trying to serve.

From hosting providers to enterprises to small organizations to my mom (who is now using DNN and loving it), we talk to a lot of consumers about what they need. During the course of this we can recognize trends and patterns in what consumers are demanding. We can help to consolidate the voices of the consumers to make it easier for the development community to meet those needs.

Organizing the community wide development effort to some degree has its advantages for all involved. If 10 developers read this blog entry and decide to go off and create a new blog module, we have only met 1 need. If instead, through communication with each other, we coordinate to figure out who is going to focus on what, and instead come up with 10 killer solutions, the impact on the DNN community, and all of us, is substantially amplified.

So, I invite consumers and developers alike to contact us. Tell us what you need. Tell us what you have or will have in the near future. Login and post a comment to this blog and let everyone know. You can also reach me personally at jmcwilliam@flatburger.com.

I have been working with DotNetNuke^TM since version 2.0. What started as “playing around” with this cool new technology for a personal site has turned into a full time job running a successful business using it. From working with customers, to developing modules, to designing skins, to putting it all together to create, test, and manage a quality solution that solves a customer’s problem, I have been involved in many aspects of what it takes to create a business using DotNetNuke^TM.

My charge now is to help others do the same. The problem we face is the old chicken and egg issue. There needs to be an ample supply of quality modules in the community in order for people to take those modules and use them to solve people’s problems. However, in order for there to be an ample supply of quality modules in the community, there needs to be sufficient demand from people willing to pay for their use in these solutions. Without someone paying the bills, it can be real hard to find the time and resources needed to create these quality modules.

My goal is to help the community gain access to the additional services, tools and resources they need in order to help push their products to the next level. I say “gain access,” because there is no single person that has all the answers. For this reason, to think that a single person, or a single company, could effectively provide those resources themselves and serve as the expert in all areas would be foolish. My job is very much one of fostering communication. For everything that I don’t know, I know there is someone out there that does. It’s helping to drive the mechanism by which people can share and exchange their collective knowledge that will yield the biggest results.

It is for this reason, that I am at Tech-Ed, talking to people, asking them what it is that would make it easier for them to create quality products. It is for the same reason that I will ask the same of you, dear reader. I want to know what you are good at and what you want to learn more about. What are the things that you provide, and what are the things that you need. I want to know the modules and pieces of functionality that you wish existed, so I can try and find people interested in creating them. I believe that for everyone that has a need, there is someone out there willing and ready to fill it. So, I invite you to help me in that effort, and email me anytime with your thoughts and feedback at jmcwilliam@flatburger.com.