I had a funny conversation with a fellow presenter while at the conference. He and I got to talking and I shared with him my work with open source. He then told me that his company (large financial services company) had been getting ready to create a large portal and did a bakeoff between IBM, Plumtree (BEA), a couple of other commercial portal products, and Liferay, a well-known open source portal (see a recent review of Liferay in InfoWorld).He then said, “Our folks found Liferay to be easier to install, easier to configure and implement, and easier to run.”Here’s the kicker — he then said “Of course, we would never use it.” (This was said more as an observation about the company’s practices rather than his personal choice). The tone of his observation was one typically associated with matters of faith. It was clear that the corporate decision wasn’t a case of not enough facts to support going with Liferay; facts were irrelevant to the decision. Open source just wasn’t good enough for this organization, end of story.I couldn’t help but be reminded of an analogous belief emanating from Detroit in the 70’s: “Americans will never drive Japanese cars. They’re too small and junky.” History isn’t kind to organizations so certain about the way the world works that they don’t actively seek innovative solutions despite their lack of mainstream acceptance. The Japanese seem to have done pretty well in the auto biz; meanwhile Detroit is mired in endless restructurings, blameshifting to the US healthcare system, and an inability to consistently build cars that appeal to consumers. Related content BrandPost The future of trust—no more playing catch up Broadcom: 2023 Tech Trends That Transform IT By Eric Chien, Director of Security Response, Symantec Enterprise Division, Broadcom Mar 31, 2023 5 mins Security BrandPost TCS gives Blackhawk Network an edge with Microsoft Cloud In this case study, Blackhawk Network’s Cara Renfroe joins Tata Consultancy Services’ Rakesh Kumar and Microsoft’s Nilendu Pattanaik to explain how TCS transformed the gift card company’s customer engagement and global operati By Tata Consultancy Services Mar 31, 2023 1 min Financial Services Industry Cloud Computing IT Leadership BrandPost How TCS pioneered the ‘borderless workspace’ with Microsoft 365 Microsoft’s modern workplace solution proved a perfect fit for improving productivity and collaboration, while maintaining security of systems and data. By Tata Consultancy Services Mar 31, 2023 1 min Financial Services Industry Microsoft Cloud Computing BrandPost Supply chain decarbonization: The missing link to net zero By improving the quality of global supply chain data, enterprises can better measure their true carbon footprint and make progress toward a net-zero business ecosystem. By Tata Consultancy Services Mar 31, 2023 2 mins Retail Industry Supply Chain Green IT Podcasts Videos Resources Events SUBSCRIBE TO OUR NEWSLETTER From our editors straight to your inbox Get started by entering your email address below. Please enter a valid email address Subscribe