What's wrong with "Lotus"?
by Volker Weber
Among the speakers is Michael Rhodin, General Manager, Workplace, Portal and Collaboration (WPLC) Software, who will be one of two keynote speakers for the conference. Rhodin became General Manager in August of last year, which means for many attendees, this will be the first opportunity to hear the new executive talk about the direction of collaborative software. His talk is billed, “Future Insights: The Road Just Ahead."
Following Rhodin to the speaker's platform will be Craig Hayman, the Vice President of Development and Technical Support for WPLC. Hayman will speak on the future of collaboration.
Is "Lotus" being replaced by the powerful new brand "WPLC"?
Comments
Sure seems like a trial baloon to do just that.
Interesting note:
WPLC may be the first sign of the next stage in the diminishing relative importance of Workplace and Portal as distinct products.
Remember, products never "FAIL" outright at IBM except in the most extreme cases. As Lotus Domino and the Notes client via Hannover quickly take over nearly all the real functionality of what was to be "Workplace", the name "Workplace" was moved "higher level" to encompass Domino and Notes as "Part of the workplace story".
These days, they are the bulk of that story, and their share of that pie continues to grow. As a result, it wouldn't surprise me to see the "workplace" term moved further up the chain and away from anything it can damage.
...sigh...
WPLC is the *internal* department name:
Workplace Portal Lotus Collaboration
Somehow it is a mess. WPLC was never meant to be communicated to the outside. Of course that it is an age old IBM tradition to come up with an super long, all inclusive name and use its abbreviation instead. Marketing still needs to learn a lesson.
:-) stw
WPLC reflects that Websphere Portal, the various Workplace products now are under Lotus care. However there is no alignment in product names. Instead of swallowing the bullet and call it Lotus Portal, Lotus Workplace etc. IBM came up with WPLC. But we know that we are good at that.
"Managed client" sounds like "managed care for the elderly" - I personally think "Workplace" is a good brand name to start, we just need to be more catchy with the second word (and not add word 3,4,5 or 6).
:-) stw
WPLC became the division name last year. We were told that it stood for Workplace, Portal and Collaboration. So what about the L? Well, the "official" explanation was that WPLC "sounds" like Workplace so that's why the L is there. Another, unsubstantiated rumor was it was going to stand for Learning but they thought better of that idea. Finally, you could say that it's a "silent" L for Lotus.
Future Insights: The Road Just Ahead
They seem to think that the're still on the road?
From my point of view they're rather way off in the meadow, further excursion into deep jungle and quick sands possible.
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