On Jan 30, 2009, at 3:07 PM, Arno Lehmann wrote:
> Hi,
>
> 29.01.2009 16:06, Foo wrote:
>> Sorry, don't have the thread in my mail anymore, so new thread.
>>
>> Today I got this snippet in the mail regarding permission to install
>> Bacula on a subcontractor's systems:
>>
>> "Regarding `the count bacula', I need to escalate your request to my
>> colleagues in *** to see if it can co-exist with ***. I'll let you
>> know."
>>
>> Somehow that sounds ominous. Personally I appreciate the
>> catchphrase's
>> humour, and apparently my counterpart above does too, but it also
>> gives
>> the wrong impression regarding maturity (of the product) to his PHB.
>>
>> If Bacula (or more importantly Bacula Systems) wants to be
>> perceived as
>> professional, it needs to be acknowledged that engineering culture
>> (read
>> humour) is not compatible with management/business culture. IMHO
>> it's a
>> mistake to rely on the engineering layer's ability to sensibly
>> filter this
>> to management, at least the 'sucks by night' catchphrase needlessly
>> complicates acceptance and has to go.
>
> I still disagree :-)
>
> When I'm talking with the management of a potential customer, I
> neither use the tag line, nor do we read over the website together...
> it's more that I offer a solution which can do this and that, works
> reliably as shown by some things, and so on. It's called Bacula, is
> open source, etc. pp.
>
> Normally, that manager doesn't want to know more - when they have an
> IT department, I discuss the details with their admins. If they don't
> have an IT department, we (hopefully) outline how I can install an
> instance of it and prove them it's working reliably.
>
> In the end, the management pays... but they never need to get in
> contact with the engineering culture, (un)intended jokes, or any puns.
>
> In the few cases where management actually dived into Bacula that deep
> that we discussed the naming (I never was in a situation where the tag
> line was an issue) it usually was a very simple thing to explain (some
> of) the reason(s) for chosing that name.
>
> In fact, if they want to talk about those things, they probably know a
> web server called "apache", whose name is also quite ridiculous. Or
> think about "Thunderbird" - that's a complete nonsense name if you
> want to relate it to the products function - Bacula, at least, refers
> to the actual function of the product.
>
> Really, I don't see why the tag line can be a concern when doing
> business around Bacula. But I guess Bacula Systems has a good enough
> marketing staff, end they might eventually stumble upon this issue -
> then I'll have to know better, perhaps :-)
All product evaluation should start with a list of requirements. We all
know about requirements collection. From there, you evaluate the
available products. Often points are awarded for various features.
I have yet to see any requirements which specified "nice name" or
"non-tacky by line".
We have much bigger and better fish to fry. Worrying about potential
users who clearly do not have their priorities in order is not on our
top
10 list.
If we were out to make money, these issues have much more merit.
As it stands now, it does not.
cheers
--
Dan Langille - http://langille.org/
BSDCan - The Technical BSD Conference : http://www.bsdcan.org/
PGCon - The PostgreSQL Conference: http://www.pgcon.org/
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