When: May 2003

What: Gartner's latest report on the J2EE application server market says IBM has pulled ahead of BEA Systems.

FUDFactor: It's easy to gain market share when you have 300 applications that fit the definition of an app server and other companies have one.

FUDBust: Application server market share numbers are as nebulous as Web server statistics. The distribution of open-source application-server solutions is widespread, yet these distributions are not counted in market share statistics because they're free and there's no way to track them.

An integral part of IBM's EAI solution is its application server, WebSphere. By including the sales of other solutions that include WebSphere, IBM is inflating its market-share numbers artificially. That's no better than Microsoft claiming higher browser or Web server market-share figures simply because it includes such products with its dominant OSs.

We can't prevent this numbers game, but we can take them with a grain of salt and perhaps even confront companies about their propping up of statistics.

Post a comment or question on this story.