I'm faced with a task that I truly detest: buying a new car. My first problem is that I really don't like owning a car, so I lack the enthusiasm that energizes so many other people. Second is the fact that I'm a terrible negotiator and car salespeople, like threatening dogs, can smell the fear. Finally, I have neither the time nor the inclination to educate myself about the range of choices available to me, but that's totally my fault, since there's a lot of it out there, and probably stems from my underlying lack of enthusiasm.

Now imagine that the car dealers made things even more difficult. Suppose, I could only have performance and reliability data that was supplied by the automakers' marketing departments, couldn't test-drive the car without buying it, and first had to divest myself of my existing car. Then, if I found the new vehicle unsatisfactory, the dealer would take back the car and reimburse me for the cost, but wouldn't cover my ancillary expenses such as insurance, registration, and transportation while I was carless.

Many people would find that repugnant, but it's pretty similar to the situation into which software vendors place customers when they prevent even independent reviewers from publishing benchmark software data.

My fellow columnists, Ed Foster and the elusive Robert X. Cringely, have documented the latest companies to enter the fray. While the practice may be legal -- and if UCITA gains even more of a foothold may be written into law -- it leaves a large ethical cloud hanging over the software industry.

It also creates a mystery: Why would software vendors want their customers to make a decision in a miasma of ignorance? I have been laboring under the impression that the whole basis of a "free-market economy" is that informed consumers make choices and that those providing goods and services rise and fall on the quality of their products.

The key word in the previous sentence is "informed." People cannot make choices without information, and the quality of the information largely determines the quality of their choices. Usually, the only ones who oppose the dissemination of information are those who have something to fear -- either from the information itself or from the choice that informed people might make.

Years ago, while a tech writer for a software company, I was writing a users' manual for a new product. I discovered that performing a series of steps in a certain order would result in a catastrophic loss of data. I discussed this with the developers, who admitted it was a problem, but that they couldn't see any way around it.

To alert users of the potential damage -- after all this was mission critical software for important industries -- I included a warning in the manual listing the probable results, if users attempted the procedure. The next sound I heard was the rumble of the product manager's footsteps, followed by a horde of marketing types, telling me that "you can't put something like that in a users' manual." They didn't want to let on the customers that there was something wrong with the software.

That created a dilemma for me. Not to include the warning, to my way of thinking, would be unethical. To include it, especially against the opposition of the product manager, wasn't a good career move. Fortunately, with persistence and a wonderfully supportive supervisor, I was able to include the warning language in the final version. I'm glad to say the company is still thriving.

In the case of benchmark data, the companies claim that the ban on publishiing test results serves to prevent inaccurate data from getting out and to prevent such data from being used by competitors. This, on the face of it, seems to be nonsense. If competitors were to misrepresent company products, the offended vendor has legal remedies available to it -- and these could be substantial.

The other possibility -- that independent testers would come up with inaccurate data -- is real, but is something that would be taken care of in a free market, where unreliable testers and publishers would fall by the wayside, as many already have. What we're left with then is the unhappy picture of software vendors on one hand championing a free-market economy and, on the other hand, doing everything possible to make sure that the market really isn't free.

When corporations restrict the free flow of information, they have already crossed an ethical line. On the other side of that line, the terrain becomes more sloped and more slippery with every step.

» posted by ITworld staff

InfoWorld

• Email
• Print
• Share
  • Slashdot
  • Digg
  • Stumble
  • Reddit
  • Newsvine