What is the point of the Single Supporter View?

At the IoF IT Group Conference yesterday, I was involved in a discussion on the "single supporter view". As the debate progressed, it became apparent that some people were talking about IT and database intergaration, whist others were re-examining the concept itself.

Especially in light of new ideas in online fundraising based aroud social networks, I wonder if the accepted wisdom of the centralisation of data, also known as the 360-degree view, is still valid?

Are you in favour or not? And what's the point of it anyway?

To prompt discussion, I've created a LinkedIn poll. Please cast your vote at:
http://polls.linkedin.com/p/38072/pkouv

And/or simply post your thoughts here ...

Comments

[jyotirmaya]

I think accessing as much information as possible from one place regards a donor is very helpful for the fundraiser - these are the guys that need to know the donor in order to solicit the donation. However, I believe that with more and more information being spread across an ever wider WWW, data feeds, smart searches and linking will be more important than trying to integrate the data into one database.....