Excellent article by Coté, who argues for an open source CMDB (Configuration Management Database):

The idea of a CMDB is enterprise software at it’s finest: it’s middleware without an implicit user-interface, has a wide-scope, means something slightly different to each user and seller, and has yet to be commoditized into freeness and ubiquity.

I see one flaw in his argument, though — much of a CMDB’s credibility, similarly to other product categories, results from its price tag: if it cost less, it would be harder to sell.