Wednesday, May 04, 2005

Questionable truth in marketing

Not to be a naysayer, but sometimes cool things bug me the wrong way when I’m pretty sure the message is a lie. Today, Skillsoft and Plateau Systems are introducing the “first” integrated LMS and LCMS to be available later this year.

First of all, I’m pretty sure they are not the first to provide an integrated system for both learning management and content management. Take a look at vendors like DigitalThink.

Second, since they are 2 separate vendors with separate systems, I’m not really all that certain they have the integration built in. To me, there’s a major difference between integration and interfaces. There is also a major difference between integration and waiting for the next maintenance patch so you can load the new LCMS courses into your LMS. Then again, words like integration, customization, configuration are so overused and mis-defined that nobody really knows anymore.

Also in this press release: "Plateau has been a key partner in SkillSoft's early stages of formulating our recently announced open learning standards architecture (OLSA)," said Chuck Moran, president and CEO of SkillSoft. So SkillSoft is developing an open standard they they expect every other LMS to use? That’s laughable.