To: David who wrote (4367 ) 3/30/1999 11:09:00 PM From: bob jordan Respond to of 4676
David, "You mean, they invested their time and limited resources just to help the biometrics industry as a whole? That makes them altruists, and from the press releases that followed HA-API's introduction, I didn't get the impression NRID was promoting this approach for other companies. No -- what was in it for NRID? That's the only relevant question." You can accuse NRI of many things, but being altruistic is hardly an accusation based in any fact. My point was not that, of course. Their motivation was personal advancement. By having all biometrics on the same plane, then NRI's software would be compatible with whatever was out there. Using a multi-biometric approach and hopefully producing quality software might persuade some companies to buy NRI software with whatever hardware. That was their motivation. "That is true. OEMs want commodity suppliers and therefore favor API development. Of course, the problem with your theory is that the OEMs (Compaq, IBM) put together the BioAPI alliance. It doesn't seem like NRID was acting as the agent for OEMs when the OEMs themselves compete with NRID's API. Further, you overlook the DoD commissioning role in HA-API's development. HA-API emphasizes coordinating different types of biometrics in individual applications, which is just the kind of deal that a high security clientele would want to see, but almost certainly overkill for commercial applications. So, I would conclude that HA-API was helpful to DoD, but wasn't what OEMs had in mind" I am not overlooking the DoD commission of this standard. Indeed NRI is a small company with limited resources that could not have pulled off the API "but-for" help (money). The fact that it helped, or would have in theory helped, NRI as well was just whipped-cream on top of the sundae. NRI was acting for its own benefit, not on behalf of OEMs or anyone else. The BioAPI was a great idea, but did not come until AFTER HAAPI started. Indeed, there was no release of a draft until very recently. NRI would be working on behalf of OEMs only if they adopted HAAPI. That OEMs wanted a new standard is fine. It just should have happened earlier, is all. "Finally, we do agree that NRID can now compete in the wider markets. Just like, say, Brown University can compete and hope to win the college basketball NCAA tournament next year. As a famous sportswriter once wrote, the race is not always to the swift, nor the fight to the strongest -- but that's the way to bet." I think that NRI has a much better shot at selling software than Brown University has at winning the NCAA tournament to say the least. Their software is multi-biometric and award winning. That will convince some people to buy, although I think price is a problem they need to address. As for the sportswriter, I am sure he bet on Duke. Regards, Bob