In summary, to determine if a gorilla game is being played, ...
I'd like to suggest that it is helpful to remind ourselves also that these labels we use -- gorilla, king, etc. -- are not absolute categories that exist in pure form in the natural world. They are categories created by Geoffrey Moore for the purpose of allowing us to better understand a variety of forces, behaviors, consequences, circumstances, etc. No sooner were the categories created than we ran into special cases. Some, like godzillas, seemed to warrant their own more-or-less unique category. Some, like PSFT, seemed to require a footnote of explanation. Some, like MSFT, are the targets of possible new categories that have yet to come into broad acceptance. Recently we have had a tentative new name suggested for JDSU.
The fact of the matter is that no business is going to be a pure simple expression of any of these categories, especially one grown large enough to have some internal diversification so that it may be playing multiple types of games at once. Consequently, I think we need to be open to adding shadings to our classifications, rather than arguing too vehemently about whether a particular company falls on this side or the other of the fence. |
