Giving Content A Wider ContextGiving Content A Wider Context

With the release this week of Context Media Inc.'s Intershare software, companies that want to extend access to digital content will be able to do so relatively inexpensively. Context is best known for its Interchange content-aggregation application, which gives content handlers a unified view of content stored in disparate systems.

Intershare's client organizes the content as a taxonomy-based file system, making it easy for unlicensed users inside and outside the firewall to locate and grab content from content-management, document-management, and digital asset-management systems, effectively bringing Interchange to a larger install base. They can do this directly from whatever application they're in, so someone creating a PowerPoint presentation can use a drop-down command from the PowerPoint file menu to grab an image or text block and import it directly into the presentation. "People don't want to have to learn more workflows," Context CEO Dan Harple says. "We're offering a workflow-agnostic approach."

But AMR Research analyst Louis Columbus says Intershare will be most valuable in letting customers more effectively syndicate content and begin charging for it. New England Cable News plans to use Intershare to let print-media partners such as The Boston Globe easily import video news clips to package with their online text coverage. That will save managing editor Steve Safran from having to answer a lot of E-mail requests. "Any automated process that takes me out of the loop would be welcome," he says. And because Intershare can also track how the content is used after it's retrieved, Safran says that data will provide him with a basis for charging for the service.

Chan Preston, managing director of the digital content-management practice at BearingPoint (formerly KPMG Consulting), says he plans to recommend Intershare for clients that don't want to establish a centralized repository for all digital content. For those that prefer to let content remain in its native application, Preston says Intershare represents a logical "baby step."

Intershare is priced at $140 per user.