Hello Steve,
Per Joe's comment I figured I would tred in this ...
> Hello Salah, the lack of press again concerns me.
And me!
> Will this company ever get it together? Maybe they plan on updating
> us on Dr Schmidt and his plans at the next Brainshare. Novell's
> strategy seems to be to stockpile as much news as they can for
> Brainshare, rather than produce a steady constant stream.
I agree that this is a broken model.
> Why is Novell dumping cold water over all their recent
> announcements?
I'm not sure what is wrong here. I agree that the momentum must continue ... but doesn't seem to. It could be a confidence issue? Or a lack of understanding? Maybe a lack of technical understanding and vision? I really don't understand this either.
> MSFT has done a great job of minimizing attention to the Active-X
> and NT security problems on the newswires and CNBC with a slew of
> new announcements...everything from WEB-TV to the new internet
> explorer that isn't even ready yet...only intended for developers.
I agree that they are an incredible marketing machine that has an effective way of delivering propaganda. Almost awesome to watch. It's like watching the Ultimate Fighting Championships ... incredibly brutal but fancinating to watch.
> I get summaries of all press releases from PRNewswire, BusinessWire,
> Reuters, and Dow Jones news delivered right to my mailbox,
> and I don't think I have seen anything regarding the Active-X
> problems. Further the newswires never carried MSFT's retraction of
> their claims of NT outselling Netware server sales. Instead, they
> carried the initial story and the re-write (still reading on MSFT's
> favor). Unless you read all the trade rags, you never would have
> known that MSFT retracted these statements.
I agree. And there are more and more of these security holes and problems ... but no obvious strategy for continued pressure.
> I don't know, but seems like the same old Novell, great products,
> great reviews, but they won't toot their own horn. I think they may
> have made a mistake hiring Dr Schmidt.
Here I have to disagree. I think that Dr. Schmidt is a good choice. I can only hope that he cleans some of the "dead-wood" that still exists in the company ... and that he demands more out of the marketing / PR ranks.
> The companies problem are marketing and PR related. They were
> already connected with SUN and Oracle, and these relationships
> would have continued to mature on their own. They already had
> superior technology and products. So, we hired a technical guy to
> get the word out?
No ... we got a person with a real vision of where all this superior technology can go and be used! I agree with the one press article that "not since Craig Burton" has Novell had vision on where to go. We now have a person who lives and understands the technology and knows where he wants it to go. Hopefully he also knows how to hire people that will make his vision reality.
> No financial details on Novonx yet, get the impression we're making
> it up as we go? They just don't move fast enough.
One side comment ... I think that when you go at internet speed you have to accept the fact that you can't take a lot of time on things. You need to learn to bob and weave and keep moving and deal with things as they come. That's the point-man attitude. When you're on point you can't have planned everything that's going to come your way!
I know this might not answer everything ... but there is considerable work going on in many parts of the company. I have to agree I'm suprised by the lack of communication. We need to keep shooting!
Scott C. Lemon |
