This reminds me of something

This reminds me of something

Posted Dec 6, 2004 20:13 UTC (Mon) by Baylink (subscriber, #755)
Parent article: The Linux Kernel's Fuzzy Future (InformationWeek)

a client told me once.

He was a salesman (and later president) of an Allied Van Lines agent here in Florida. When he was just a young turk salesman, one of the older guys gave him a great selling idea: when talking to the potential customer, work into the conversation, just off hand, that "a good salesman would never smoke in your house" (this was the 60's :-).

That is, put the other salesmen at a disadvantage they don't even know they possess, by inventing some cock-a-mamie criterion that they don't know they're being judged on.

That's what's happening here, too.

"We have no Five Year Plan. We must be Bad!"

Nuh uh.

Cause, I mean, c'mon: go look at the companies in the Unix market that *do* have a Five Year Plan. They're in, by and large, about as good shape as *another* organization notable for Five Year Plans.

Oh, wait: it's pretty much only SCO (and they're a fucked company walking), and Sun (and they're "open sourcing"). Oh, and AIX, and IBM's given us most of the good parts.

Got it.

Yeah; let's put on the Jack Welch hat, and do some strategic planning.

Cause that's workin' real well.

(This message brought to you by the "So many things are just me" radio network.)

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