My2c + on MapInfo vs ESRI marketing and reputation (warning, kind of long)
I think this topic is of utmost importance to MapInfo users and fans around
the world. MapInfo Pro has to remain a product focus of MapInfo corp and
needs to be given more development and marketing attention.
Regarding reputation – i.e. MapInfo = business and ESRI =
govt/environmental/real-world mapping etc. I have personal experience with
this one – I built a GIS division from the ground up for an environmental
and engineering consulting firm. I built it on MapInfo. It worked and it
worked well. In fact, the folks in charge were continually amazed at the
speed and cost-effectiveness of our operation relative to the experiences of
their counterparts in the field, all of whom ran with ESRI GIS often at
great expense (AInfo+HardWare). In fact, almost all of our clients used
ESRI products as well, but when we had an option we always did our in house
data processing, analysis, map making, etc in MapInfo and with related tools
such as Vertical Mapper. BTW, Vertical Mapper 3 is coming and in discussing
MapInfo for 'real GIS' VM warrants some words – VM is a ripping good tool
even stacked up against the AV extension equivalents. I can’t say enough
about being able to download the 4 intersected DEMS your project inevitably
straddles, directly feed them into VM from exactly the format they come to
you in, stitch them together, reproject the grid, clip it to a custom
boundary, and do analysis such as viewsheds – all in a matter of minutes not
hours.
Now that I run my own GIS business it is the same deal – I’ll do work in
MapInfo even for ESRI clients when work is not software-specific (i.e. not
an ArcView app or something). The funny thing is that much of the work is
in the ‘real-world mapping’ category and in government and environmental and
planning arenas – ESRI’s by reputation. And the market presence of ESRI in
these areas is so dominant in my recent experience that most decision makers
do not consider ANY other options. This is demonstrated in a recent RFP
calling for an evaluation of GIS software options in the beginning but
specifying work with Avenue later in the same document. I've seen more than
a few of these where the evaluation is which configuration of ESRI goodies
to buy or how many seats of ArcView, not what other choices might be. When
I’ve had the opportunity to show MapInfo against ArcView 3.x it never fails
to impress, especially those trying to learn GIS for the first time via
ArcView. Things such as reprojecting on the fly and connecting to Access
directly are often show stoppers as simple and familiar as they are to
experienced MapInfo users.
Back to reputation – I live in a backward world doing my environmental GIS
in MapInfo and sharing offices with an ESRI-based business GIS shop. We are
proof that the reputation has much more to do with marketing than it does
with capabilities or software suitability (we are both trying to 'convert'
each other all the time - it is quite entertaining). Truth is the new ESRI
tools are very strong and will quickly come to dominate the GIS market and
MapInfo needs to push Pro ahead to keep pace. I agree with some of the
previous commenters that it would serve MapInfo well to have some
geographers on board to help guide both development and marketing. And
getting into the education and govt streams/arenas more thoroughly seems
like one of the best ways to build more critical mass amongst professional
GIS users. In geography grad schools all over you find Arc-based labs
almost exclusively.
Finally, I get to feel smug and secure when my ArcView friends get excited
about reprojection on the fly or labeling with expressions…but only for a
moment…then I see my MapInfo 6.5 upgrade mailers in 3 places touting “invert
selection” as a major new feature. Then they fire back a volley saying it
took an awful long time for MI to implement the code "not in".
I could go on but I have to go play with my new 3D glasses shipped with
MI6.5:)
Happy Monday.
Will Mitchell
Mitchell Geographics, Inc.
496 Congress Street
Portland, ME 04101
www.mitchellgeo.com
ph 207.879.7769
fx 207.253.5756
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]]On Behalf Of
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Sent: Saturday, June 16, 2001 11:49 AM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: MI-L skills and markets
It seems to me that part of the problem with the perceptions of
MapInfo are due to what I would consider very poor marketing decisions. To
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