[Typo3] Some feedback to TYPO3 marketeers

[Simon Hobbs]

To Advocates of TYPO3,

I saw some threads about "marketing to U.S." and I thought there are 
some people on this list that might find my opinion useful - 
particularly from a marketing perspective.

I have officially stopped pursuing TYPO3 as a CMS platform. The main 
reason for my decision is nothing to do with TYPO3 itself, but that the 
resources are substandard and in disarray. The second reason is that the 
learning curve is too high, and installation too problematic. I don't 
think any of you are ignorant of that (eg. 
http://typo3.org/documentation/document-library/StartHere/ ).

 From what I have read about TYPO3, there are some great features which 
I was looking forward to try. But I couldn't install TYPO3 _at all_ on 
Linux OR Windows and this is a real problem for TYPO3 advocates. While I 
waited  for help from the linux-installation list, I thought I would 
compare my experience by installing a Drupal site - it took me 30 
minutes. Thus Drupal became the first CMS system I installed.

One gobsmacking thing for me was the hoopla concerning imagemagick. The 
versioning issue is truly shocking. I should have been able to simply 
install a single php file of "wrapper functions" appropriate to the 
version of imagemagick I was running.

But to be more general, there are other things about TYPO3 which make it 
  difficult to market.

The first of these things is the accessibility of expertise and 
networking tools. The large majority of people using cms tools are 
laypeople building small sites. Something like Drupal is always going to 
be more accessible and more enjoyable. Just compare using a newsreader 
with a beautiful forum like drupal.org.

Your response might be: that your target market is large companies. One 
benefit is that T3 is an open-licenced solution with flexibility and 
robustness. But none of that comes across to the average middle-manager 
unless it is properly sold. You need well resourced developers who can 
demonstrate the value of TYPO3. Some products sell themselves, but a CMS 
is sold by people. So forget the "marketing strategy", if anyone has any 
spare energy they should put it into helping other developers by 
improving the tools and resources.

My final point about marketing image concerns Kasper's Korner. Kasper is 
giving the community an image problem by imposing a "Moral Licence" on 
the software (http://typo3.org/community/people/kaspers-korner/ ). In 
the context of his faith, he himself is not God, so therefore he is in 
no position to sit in judgement of what constitutes "proper" material 
for a TYPO3 based website.

Where I am from, people consider environmentalists to be "extremists", 
so do i take it that Kasper believes that Jesus is some sort of 
consumption loving capitalist? My emotional response to Kasper's Moral 
Licence is very common amongst non-Christians, and I contend that 
overall it puts people off TYPO3. Kasper should re-assess his position 
and ask himself whether God wants him to alienate people, or rather 
prefers him to influence through his actions as exemplified by Kasper's 
Saviour.

I wish you all the best with TYPO3.

Kind Regards
Simon Hobbs
info at urbits.com