Comments on: Blackbaud Introduces “Wave”, Social Networking for Blackbaud NetCommunity

By: philldo

philldo — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 13:53:23 +0000

I mostly agree with Michelle Murrain that most people will not be very active or even join their np’s social network. On the other hand, I do a lot of work with churches. The social networking aspect would fit in nicely with “small groups” (Bible Study Communities). These groups are starting to utilize social networking to keep in touch during the week and to plan outings. I am interested to play with the “wave”

By: Shaun Sullivan Casts Himself as a Member of the Borg | Non-Profit Tech Blog

Shaun Sullivan Casts Himself as a Member of the Borg | Non-Profit Tech Blog — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 02:15:53 +0000

[...] Shaun Sullivan parodied himself as Locutus of Borg. This was in response to a half-joking comment I made about Blackbaud’s tendency to gobble up the competition. [...]

By: Allan Benamer

Allan Benamer — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 22:16:44 +0000

@Michelle Murrain:Ok, I would normally have the same reaction as you but I saw the software myself last week. I’ll post about it soon in more detail but the biggest feature is the ultimate integration of social networking with Raiser’s Edge. It’s a pretty integration — probably some room for tweaking but you can now get more information than ever before on your online constituents because you can track their profiles and activity. The ramifications are unknown but you can guess it’s a better to fine-tune your appeals.

By: Michelle Murrain

Michelle Murrain — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 21:22:25 +0000

I don’t get the social networking piece. Is this going to cause nonprofits to waste lots of time creating social networks that *no one* is going to join? Social network savvy orgs know not to go down this road, but what about the others? I’ve heard a few stories of orgs sending lots of money down that particular toilet.

By: Shaun Sullivan

Shaun Sullivan — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 16:14:21 +0000

Will Shaun Sullivan dress up as Locutus for Halloween?

That was cute

By: Allan Benamer

Allan Benamer — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 05:14:23 +0000

Yeah that too. I'm really curious about how Blackbaud plays the thread out. Some questions are:

How soon before Kintera gets truly merged into the Blackbaud Borg
How does eTapestry fit into that Borg collective?
Will Shaun Sullivan dress up as Locutus for Halloween?

and so on...

By: RHP

RHP — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 01:35:41 +0000

Will Blackbaud be in the business of competing against itself in some macabre version of closed-systems competition?

Seems that’s already happening, hence the flurry of Infinity/BBEC and NetSol (press) releases since the Kintera acquisition announcement.

Not necessarily bad, in the short term.

RE Integration is always custom anyway, according to how a given org uniquely plays with its data in the context of optimally interacting with the Universe.

Blackbaud decides to go forward with deeper Kintera CMS integration

You mean CRM (by extension)?

By: Allan Benamer

Allan Benamer — Sat, 02 Aug 2008 06:12:32 +0000

Agreed — but then again integration options for RE are limited when it comes to other systems. What’s going to be REALLY interesting is if Blackbaud decides to go forward with deeper Kintera CMS integration. Will that integration be tighter? Will Blackbaud be in the business of competing against itself in some macabre version of closed-systems competition? Yikes.

By: Peter Gulka

Peter Gulka — Fri, 01 Aug 2008 15:44:42 +0000

Is it perfect? No. But the integration with RE makes up for almost any shortfall that I’ve discovered when comparing it to other systems.