May 20, 2013 - Vendor Alley

The Passion Of Bob Hale

May 20th, 2013

The fight to keep the option of associations and MLS providers to give their members a choice of providing a public facing MLS site could have no better hero than Bob Hale.

He seems to be everywhere. And when he isn’t there, his name is still on the lips of everyone. In D.C. you had a sense that Bob was fighting for much more than the right for MLS public facing websites, he was fighting for his legacy.

I can’t say that I know Bob all that well. But when first meeting him and his wife Susie you got a feeling that these were “good people”. From time to time he does send me a text or a quick email with an insightful comment on a blog post I have written. I think he gets my weird sense of humor. His name has been so prevalent in our industry a few years ago I came up with the Vendor Alley awards, and the top “Vendy” I dubbed “The Anyone But Bob Hale Award”. I was glad to hear he liked the homage.

A quick story. I was visiting Houston a couple months ago and had a chance to get a tour of the HAR Central Office. Sam Scott graciously led me around introducing me to staff members. Towards the end of the tour we stopped by Rene Galvan”s office. Papers with handwritten notes were strewn across Rene’s desk. Bob was seating at the end of Rene’s desk just finishing up a phone call. They had been working on the MLS policy back then, and it was apparent they had been working for hours (days) and more hours (days) to come. “Hey buddy,” he said, “How you doing? Welcome!” His phone rang again, “I gotta get this”, and he was back working the phones. Lyndon Johnson would be ashamed. My impression was its not easy being Bob Hale, it takes work. A lot of work.

When I walked in to the the MLS Policy committee meeting last week Bob was at the microphone. He was summarizing the importance of MLS public facing websites. Answering questions, fielding counter arguments, always with a glint in his eye….in the arena.

The fight isn’t over. More challenges lie ahead. His biggest yet might be finding a decent hotel room in Boise at the 2013 CMLS conference. But this year, if I had to give out the “Anyone But Bob Hale Award”, I would have to give it to…Bob Hale.

DotLoop gets sued. Several organizations file cease and desists.

May 20th, 2013

Last week wasn’t so great for DotLoop. It was disclosed LoopNet filed a lawsuit against Dotloop for a Trademark Infringement. Which I think is ridiculous but I did find this tidbit in the “Answer and Jury Demand” document interesting.

“4. Defendant admits that dotloop was founded as “MLS Contracts” in 2008 and that its name was changed to “dotloop” in 2009.”

“MLS Contracts”? What a hoot! The more disturbing thing I’ve heard is that several state, local and MLS providers has issued Dotloop cease and desist letters for improperly using forms and contracts in their software. As most vendors know in this space forms are copyrighted and it takes a significant amount of time and resources to obtain licenses for these forms. Lets hope DotLoop does the right thing and honors these copyrights and licenses.

UPDATE: I also forgot to mention the news that Docusign acquired Cartavi. Like I said, not a good week.

NAR Midyear recap link pack

May 20th, 2013

What a week. The meetings, the parties, the dinners, and the drama is over. Or has it just begun? Here are a few takeaways.

CMLX was a hit!

The Council of MLS'(CMLS) new certification program, CMLX, was held last Tuesday. I spoke to several who attended and the feedback was terrific. I know that a lot of people put a tredmendous amount of effort to get this thing off the ground so congrats to all of them for pulling off a successful program. You can find out more here.

Quote of the week:

Dale Stinton

“You can’t ever talk about a national MLS without getting into trouble. You can’t talk about the number of associations without getting in to trouble. You cant ever talk about professional standards without getting in to trouble,” Stinton warned. “What I’m here to say on behalf of leadership is we’re ready to get in trouble.”

When I read this quote the first time I had to quickly check VendorAlley.com to see if Dale had stolen the brass balls on the right. They’re still there.

The big news you didn’t hear about.

There was some HUGE news that didn’t break at the conference. I’m surprised that the secret was kept. More on this later in the week.

Unleash the hounds.

Was it confusing to anyone else to hear early in the week that people loudly applauded “taking back realtor.com” to then hear this past weekend NAR may let realtor.com “do more“.

The real reason NAR included MLS public facing websites as a basic service.

This may be obvious to everyone else, but imagine if the NAR Executive Committee amendments stuck and MLS providers could no longer charge members or promote their public facing websites. What would that have meant for realtor.com? Isn’t that NAR’s “public facing website”? Or was that the final goal of big brokers all the time?

Real Estate is back! Lets party.

My thanks to ListHub for throwing a great party. Cloud CMA was a co-sponsor and the party was off the hook!

Speaking of parties…

It’s John Heithaus’ rock and roll fantasy, we just live in it! Once again John’s band got everyone’s groove on at the RETechnology party. Thanks to John and Victor for throwing another great event.