Open source and Digital Asset Management

Added By Tony Byrne at 22-May-2008 | Twitter: @TonyByrne |

Joseph Bachana recently posted in these pages an excellent article on the Digital Asset Management (DAM) marketplace. I disagreed somewhat, though, with his conclusion:

In the end, it may take the harnessed fervor of the open source community to bring all these threads and more together in the marketplace over the next 24 to 36 months.

There's no doubt that a more visible and active open source DAM project than what's out there now would help spur greater competition and innovation in that space. It has certainly done so in other technologies we cover.

But if you are looking to implement DAM technology, don't wait for an open source package to arrive deus ex machina to resolve the challenges you face selecting among the wide array of mostly smallish DAM vendors (see our report for more detail here). It's tempting to think that harnessed fervor will tackle the very substantial technical challenges that DAM tools try to address, but I'm skeptical here.

As Bachana's article points out, the shadow of Adobe looms large here. Much the same way that open source document management platforms get hamstrung by their arms-length relationship to Office and Windows, I think open source DAM tools will have a hard time embracing Adobe and its raft of proprietary tools and protocols. I'll still stay hopeful, and we'll keep watching, but don't hold your breath on this one...

Categories: Tony Byrne, Digital Asset Management, Marketplace at Large, Open Source, Selecting Technology