When we originally conceived the idea of SIEM and log management solution for IT managers many years ago, it was because of the problems they faced dealing with high volumes of cryptic audit logs from multiple sources. Searching, categorizing/analyzing, performing forensics and remediation for system security and operational challenges evidenced in disparate audit logs were time consuming, tedious, inconsistent and unrewarding tasks.  We wanted to provide technology that would make problem detection, understanding and therefore remediation, faster and easier.

A recent article in Slate caught my eye; it was all about Infomercials…staple of late night TV and a pitch-a-thon that was conducted in Washington DC for new ideas. The question is just how would you know a “successful” idea if you heard it described?

By now, SIEM has “Crossed the Chasm” , indeed the Gartner MQ puts it well into mainstream adoption, but in the early days, there was some question as to whether this was a real problem or if, as is too often the case, if SIEM and log management was a solution in search of a problem.

Back to the question — how does one determine the viability of an invention before it is released into the market?  Jacob Goldenberg, a professor of marketing at Hebrew University in Jerusalem and a visiting professor at Columbia University, has coded a kind of DNA for successful inventions. After studying a year’s worth of new product launches, Goldenberg developed a classification system to predict the potential success of a new product. He found the same patterns embedded in every watershed invention.

The first is subtraction—the removal of part of a previous invention.

For example, an ATM is a successful invention because it subtracts the bank teller.

Multiplication is the second pattern, and it describes an invention with a component copied to serve some alternate purpose.  Example: the digital camera’s additional flash to prevent “red-eye.”

A TV remote exemplifies the third pattern: division. It’s a product that has been physically divided, or separated, from the original; the remote was “divided” off of the TV.

The fourth pattern, task unification, involves saddling a product with an additional job unrelated to its original function. The iPhone is the quintessential task unifier.

SIEM and log management solutions subtract (liberate) embedded logs and log management functionality from source systems.

SIEM and log management solutions (via aggregation) the problems that can be detected with correlation that would have gone unnoticed otherwise.

EventTracker also meets the last two criteria–arguably decent tools for managing logs ought to have been included by OS and platform vendors (Unix, Linux, Windows, Cisco all have very rudimentary tools for this, if anything); so one can say EventTracker provides something needed for operations (like the TV remote) but not included in the base product.

With the myriad features now available such as configuration assessment, change audit, netflow monitoring and system status, the task unification criteria is also satisfied; you can now address a lot of security and operational requirements that are not strictly “log” related – “task unification”.

When President Obama praised innovation as a critical element in the recovery in his State of the Union, he may not have had “As Seen on TV” in mind but does SIEM fit the bill?

What’s the message supposed to be?  That SIEM and log management solutions are (now?) a good invention? SIEM has crossed the chasm!