Readers' Comments

Reader Comments on Aardvark Daily 16 May 2003
Note: the comments below are the unabridged submissions of readers and do
not necessarily reflect the opinions of the publisher.
From: Lindsay
For : The Editor (for publication)
Subj: 1.9mil for a website

I totally agree with your breakdown of costs for a web
site. If you employ people directly you can get stuff done
far cheaper - like you say $160K per year will easily get
you two full time web staff - the same again for reporters
and you've got a fully staffed website with people working
all year for content and delivery. Four people whose sole
repsonsibility is making that website the best it can be.

Instead they contract some company (who knows how they
choose that - insert period of budgeted lunches - drinks,
trips across the country) who will charge them over $100 an
hour per developer - plus design costs - to build a website
that will not be the main focus of the company who built
it - instead becoming part of the 'Support' section - one
of the many jobs to take care of. Updates will happend when
there is sufficient content to warrant a work request, and
when the company has the capacity to complete the work.

Result - more cost - worse site.




From: Alan
For : The Editor (for publication)
Subj: $1.9m on a website? Here's where it's going

Here's an idea where the money goes, and it goes on every
day :)

As a professional developer myself, I had to sit through a
meeting one time with a rival company who were also
pitching their speil, where according to this very well
known and very international company [because they were
from an overseas firm, they had to know what was best you
see] this certain project 'couldn't take less than X months
to do' and also that it 'absolutely couldn't be done' any
other way or for 'anything less' than the absolutely stupid
amount of money they wanted for developing it. What CRAP it
was to listen to. It was a real good insight though ...

The Client went to this particular company in the end, only
to find out a few months later that they could have got it
for a lot less, so they fired the previous developers after
spending half the budget already and came back, this time
to me. After spending the initial budget already, naturally
they had a little difficulty convincing the board to cough
up some more to pay me. Oh and they also had an ever so
slight problem finding yet more money to buy themselves out
of the agreement they'd already made, but which turned out
to be utterly the wrong solution. Basically paid out 3
times as much as they needed to in the first place, but oh
well, it *was* associated at least with a Government
dept. ...

Now, no doubt the Government itself realises that good web
site design doesn't come cheap. So they probably think that
throwing at least 2m behind a website will make it worth
their while, somehow, because then they'll be able to hire
all those pro consultants, and the consultants to the
consultants, who will no doubt produce a few reports which
the could have been produced by the Janitor. I have
removed, for the purposes of this email, a line in a
specially comissioned report I know cost between $5-600. It
is however the word of a Most High Consultant, and
therefore deomonstrates what they'll be getting for their
money, lines such as:

"It is our general conclusion also that the Web Site will
need to be overahuled several times a year. This is
justified on several fronts, the main one being that our
research has shown that people tend to come back to this
web site often. Although this represents another cost, we
do recommend that the budget be increased again to cater
toward impending redevelopment, and further that we be
retained in our present role as consultants to monitor
current usage and provide reports on its effects for your
future business and its online presence. For the purposes
of maintaining total integrity in terms of the development,
we do not recommend in house training at this stage, but to
keep our present deployment of five Site Engineering Staff*
to manage and maintain the Web Site and its content for no
less than 6 months. After this period has elapsed we think
it prudent to conduct another full review of the entire
process, and a decision can then be made as to whether we
be retained for another 6 months ..."

Yes, 5 "site engineering staff" for one web site. Pathetic.
Just another sucker from the well attended "But they charge
$200 an hour, they MUST know what they're doing right?"
school of Clients. Hope the Government hasn't enrolled
yet..
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