There's a new spin in the dedupe marketplace these days. Several of the smaller and more recent entrants to the market are waving the 'second generation' flag. This is the typical nonsense that accompanies products that are late to market. In my experience, 'late' and 'better prepared' are usually antithetical. Ask any high school teacher lucky enough to have had me as a student in a first period class. It's like implying that sitting on the sidelines for the entire season makes the backup quarterback better than the guy who has taken every snap and led the team to the championship. Not a very logical argument.
In very broad terms I think the occasional success of this 'lack of real experience is a leadership quality' message is somewhat enabled by a broad turn in the perception of dedupe. Looking back as recently as last year, people who were investigating deduplication were asking the difficult and important questions. There wasn't an inherent trust that the technology actually worked and was suitable for production. The problem today is that the tough questions are fewer and farther between.
People can quickly be made to forget that dedupe is extremely hard to do. As evidence to support this hypothesis I'd point to EMC's dedupe portfolio. First, let me be clear. This isn't an attack on the Avamar technology they purchased or the Quantum technology they repackage. Those are different topics for a different day. The point I'd make here is that for a company as large as EMC, neither of the two deduplication technologies they bring to market were developed internally. You would think that EMC at least tried to build a dedupe product internally, and perhaps they did. But the trend seems to continue with IBM also looking to the outside world for help to release a dedupe product.
Developing a deduplication product is not trivial. If it were just about time and money, EMC and IBM certainly have the resources to go it alone. Even when you do partner, there is no guarantee that the product will be ready for prime time.
So why is it that any vendors are getting a free pass today on what should be a rigorous examination of technology? To be very clear, I've used EMC and IBM as examples to demonstrate that building dedupe is hard - i.e. you can't just throw dollars at the problem and cross your fingers. However, these are not necessarily the same vendors selling the 'second generation' story. Those 'vendors who shall not be spoken of' won't get a free bump in their Google relevance ranking here. Wait, if I'm speaking about the ones who shall not be spoken of...
Let me put it directly. Data Domain has spent years in the real world proving our technology does what we claim, across thousands of customers in a myriad of complex environments. We've earned our solid reputation and continue to do so day in and day out. We have advanced the state of the technology by leaps and bounds over a long period of time with a great amount of engineering effort, upon a foundation of production deployment experience that is second to none in the industry. And yet I'd gladly return our free pass and welcome renewed skepticism from potential customers. Once the misperception that dedupe is easy is allowed to take hold, it takes a truly open mind to return to a healthy level of doubt. And that's exactly what needs to happen in order to make an informed decision. Otherwise, we have a bizarre situation where new, immature and untested products in the dedupe marketplace are attempting to rest upon Data Domain's laurels. That makes as much sense as version 1.0 being billed as a 'second generation' product.
You would think that EMC at least tried to build a dedupe product internally, and perhaps they did. But the trend seems to continue with IBM also looking to the outside world for help to release a dedupe product.
Posted by: buy viagra | 03/29/2010 at 09:18 AM
Great point of view. Your article was awesome. Thanks for the info.
Posted by: bad credit repair | 06/15/2011 at 10:08 PM
Seldom I find great blogs like this..so please keep up the good work.
Posted by: Einspeisevergütung Photovoltaik | 06/28/2011 at 08:12 PM
But the trend seems to continue with IBM also looking to the outside world for help to release a dedupe product.
Posted by: autovermietung auf mallorca flughafen | 06/30/2011 at 06:00 PM
I’m always excited to stop by that blog in the evenings.Please keep on churning out the content. It’s very entertaining.
Posted by: Liability insurance | 08/01/2011 at 03:45 AM
It's so nice to have you do all of the research for us. It makes our decision making so much easier!! Thanks.
Posted by: msi credit | 08/17/2011 at 03:58 AM
The article you have been posted on the website have some influence on the republic of letters. Good job. Go on working and you will achieve much more success.
Posted by: sky blue credit | 09/08/2011 at 04:01 AM
My fovorite site is www.dedupematters.com !
macbook air
Posted by: macbook-air-giveaway | 11/12/2011 at 12:10 AM
Backups are never really thought about until inevitably you lose your data and then you quickly appreciate how important they are.
Posted by: credit repair | 11/17/2011 at 03:14 PM
Very informative post. I don't think I've come across the angle you present the information in a brilliant way.
Posted by: San Mateo carpet cleaning | 12/23/2011 at 05:44 AM
It's so nice to have you do all of the research for us. It makes our decision making so much easier!! Thanks.
Posted by: cleaning services hawthorn | 12/25/2011 at 04:56 PM
MeIvsY However, the author created a cool thing..!!
Posted by: microsoft oem software | 12/28/2011 at 01:02 AM
I’m always excited to stop by that blog in the evenings.Please keep on churning out the content. It’s very entertaining.
Posted by: carpet cleaning point piper | 02/08/2012 at 01:27 AM