CHOOSING THE BEST:
CTI Magazine's 1998 Products Of The Year

This past year, we've witnessed an unprecedented proliferation of CTI products. Indeed, these new products evidence so much variety, and confront us in such quantity, that they can sometimes seem, well, overwhelming.

While we may feel overwhelmed, we shouldn't be surprised. Consider this quick, back-of-the-envelope calculation: The August Buyer's Guide issue of CTI magazine reveals over 1,000 vendors of products listed in over 150 different categories. Even if each of these vendors released only a single new product or significant product upgrade per year, that would mean over 1,000 new releases in 1998. Add to this the fact that many vendors release multiple products - some perhaps a dozen or more - over the course of a year, and it isn't difficult to estimate that there would be at least 5,000 new products or product upgrades in the CTI market in any given year.

This wealth of new products led to the tidal wave of applications and supporting materials that we received for CTI's Product of the Year award, and it placed quite a burden on the editors of CTI and TMC Labs. Various editors and supporting personnel worked for days on end to differentiate between the applicants and their products and come up with suitable categories that represented the breadth and variety of the CTI world without overlooking the potential of specific solutions.

The process of selection for Product of the Year was somewhat like the Grammy awards or similar "Best of 1998" awards you might see in a magazine like Publisher's Weekly - categories were defined and refined to be sure that nothing of significance was left out, as well as to provide additional value for our readers. It's often not enough to have "Best Actor." Instead, there must be numerous categories: Best Actor, Male; Best Actor, Female; Best Supporting Actor….

Without exception, the editorial review board tasked with choosing the Product of the Year winners found the biggest challenge to be determining the exact market for the submitted product and how to compare similar products to one another. Press releases and data sheets often use similar language, lauding their products with catch-phrases; frequently such releases never get around to telling what it is that the product is. More than once, editors were left scratching their heads after reading an application or release that seemed to go out of its way to avoid specificity.

While it is understandable that many vendors wish to reach the largest possible market for their products, there is also a beauty in being able to say exactly what a given product does, and who it does it for. Often it is not so much the quantity of language that impresses a reader, but rather a certain well-thought-out scarcity that allows for precision as well as praise.

With that in mind, we have done our best to select the top five percent or so in a field that is thick with products and potential. A field that continues to grow beyond most people's expectations. Singling out these products and categorizing them as we award them "Product of the Year" is a process that we hope helps readers better understand the best representatives of categories that are of interest to them.

Needless to say, the categories are not perfect. A walk through a record store can quickly demonstrate how difficult it is to categorize anything (do Nine Inch Nails, Madonna, and Elvis Presley really all belong together in the Rock/Pop category?). And yet, without these categories, consumers would find it impossible to locate their favorite albums. Equally so with the world of CTI and the Product of the Year. We hope that this table helps.