Design Intelligence 2010
Making Archives Of Internet Based Competitive Intelligence
At some point with any sensitive information, the original publisher might decide for various reasons to remove previously available information, and it is at these times that it would be most useful to have your own copy of the data in question. Online copy services are often used to store content previously held offline, and this is no different for people who work intensively with web information, such as competitive intelligence analysts. The reverse applies to backing up competitive intelligence, which is usually found on the internet, so needs to be backed up on offline media, although it could also be backed up on alternative internet based sources. Why do this? In part the paranoia that any good competitive intelligence worker will have about key sources of data being managed by parties beyond their control, who may not have the same vested interest in keeping the data accessible. In two recent cases from the online sector, the need for copies was made clear.
When Microsoft was preparing to reinvigorate its Live brand, some of the marketing ideas that it was considering suddenly appeared on YouTube without the company’s explicit approval. Shortly after the video was blogged about, it was no longer to be found on its original source of YouTube. In this case although the information was withdrawn, it did not make much difference as there were already archives in existence. In such a typical instance of data being found on a website it would be worthwhile to back it up so that it may be accessed without fear of it being discontinued.
It is a common thing for intelligence to be made public as a matter of course that corporations may wish had not reached an external audience. Online information such as press articles, quotations, videos or photos may be withdrawn with no prior notice, removing valuable evidence. One obvious reason is that either the publisher of the information or more likely the target to whom the intelligence pertains, does not want it public. Such was what happened with the Microsoft Live story.
Something along these lines happened with Google head Eric Schmidt. Eric Schmidt felt the need to stop the writings of one of his girlfriends, who after their relationship ended decided to write about it in a public manner; the data was soon taken down at the request of his attorneys. There would have been clear benefits in having an archive of the information.
It would be best to make personal copies of competitive intelligence that may end up being removed. Although economically and otherwise unfeasible, the temptation for the sake of completeness would be to make local versions of all possible competitive intelligence.
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