The reason I say this is that because the iPod touch was (I believe) provided to people who paid full registration price to attend a conference — which is not the same thing as purchasing a CMS. The “gift” was not actually a gift as there is a lower ticket price that does not include the iPod. When you pay the higher price for admission, you get the iPod. But, let’s be clear, you’re not getting a gift; you’re buying an iPod…and a conference ticket.

That said, I agree that many organizations have policies against receiving gifts that should be respected in these situations. If your employer pays for the ticket and the iPod and doesn’t know they are paying for the iPod, that makes the conference attendee (the employee) corrupt.

The definition of the word corrupt means guilty of dishonest practices. It’s not dishonest to accept a free hotel room or airfare assistance or speaking fee when a vendor asks you to travel thousands of miles and take up several days of billable time to speak at a conference. That’s called compensation. Everyone deserves to be compensated. But not everyone chooses to accept the compensation. Nor should they be forced to. It’s a personal choice.

For me, I will not recommend any vendor when it’s not a good fit for the client, regardless of whether they treat me special, provide me with free software, or pay me to travel to an event. I am happy to be compensated for my time, regardless of the duty I am performing. Of course, I’m not easily dazzled by the shiny prizes vendors use to hypnotize potential customers and influencers like myself. Some others, however, may be able to be influenced.

The bigger scandal has nothing to do with freebies or compensation. The biggest challenge I see is vendor neutral consultants that fail to speak up and tell CMS vendors that it’s not acceptable that they don’t practice what they preach. It’s high time that we stop pretending that it doesn’t matter when CMS vendors don’t use their own tools in the way they tell their clients to. It’s ridiculous for anyone who calls themselves a CMS professional to allow vendors to get away with not practicing the same techniques that our clients will have to use in order to make their CMS do what it was designed to do.

Thanks for starting this discussion. It’s meaningful and thought provoking. And, of course, there are many viewpoints.

“Which Comes First: the Crew or the CMS?”
http://jonontech.com/2009/04/12/which-comes-first-the-crew-or-the-cms/

The main thought is whether it is ethical for an SI / Agency ever to help with a CMS Vendor Selection exercise. Or can only truly impartial non-implementers (such as J. Boye or CMS Watch) do this fairly.

Of course corruption exists. One of the reasons governments and large corporations have complex procurement processes and rules is to try to combat corruption. This then creates an escalating arms race as people try to find ways around the rules. And the consequences of this arms race is that a lot of good options get excluded. So corruption ultimately creates costs for all of us.

As your examples show, corruption can be a complex issue and drawing the boundaries is often fuzzy. At the heart of it, all people are biased — we seldom (if ever) make decisions on purely rational grounds. Lots of things influence our preceptions of vendors and hence what we buy. This is why organisations invest in branding, advertising, salespeople, etc. Most of this investment is fine; some of it crosses the boundary; all of it creates biases. What we need to do is to try to find some way to make “fair” decisions in amongst all the different biases amongst the decision makes and influencers.

For me, the crux here is transparency. If I know that the speaker at a conference is being paid by a vendor, then I can take that into account when assessing what they say. If my client knows that I’ve worked on projects to implement Plone and Interwoven but not on Mediasurface, then they can assess my advice accordingly. (Of course, the bias goes both ways — having worked with them, I know more about their weaknesses as well as their strengths.) And if I’m offered a “discount” by a vendor, I always pass it on to the client (as you’ll have seen with people I’ve recommended to your conferences and CoPs).

BTW this is also why consumer protection law is so much stronger than for corporates. Consumers don’t have the resources and expertise to fully assess the biases in the messages they receive, so the law protects them. Corporate bodies are expected to exercise judgement for themselves. Corruption exists not just because some people break they rules — it also exists because some buyers fail to exercise appropriate judgement. We’re all accountable for eliminating corruption.

Graham

Perhaps corruption qualifies as another inconvenient truth?

Similarly as selfish as the third point, I don’t like the software sales fees i.e. kickbacks that company’s can get from vendors. Company’s like system integrators and consultants could get a kickback from software vendors when they work through the sales cycle between a vendor and a customer. I think these kickbacks are on balance sheets as influencer fees, agent fee, referral fee, introduction commissions, etc… I do not accept these fees and I let people I work with that I do not like these types of fees discussed or transacted. If SI’s, consultants, or whoever wants to sell software they can do it the transparent way of becoming a VAR for the vendor.

Cheers!
-Travis