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Technology Stocks : Oracle Corporation (ORCL)

ORCL 217.60

+1.5%

Dec 5 9:30 AM EST

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To: Michael Olin who wrote (8771)	11/6/1998 4:15:00 PM
From: John F. Dowd	Read Replies (3) of 19080

Dear Michael: These are all questions that are best left for the market place to address. Your angst for a cradle to grave livelihood without having to alter your job skills from time to time is understandable but unwarranted. I was a pilot (very narrow job skill set) for 28 years with an airline that had me furloughed for 14 of those 28 years. During those years of furlough I had to go out and in short order generate an equivalent income in other fields. Notwithsatnding this less than smooth career path and with the Lord's blessing, I was able to make a living and amass a tidy sum for my present retirement while raising 9 children without requiring my wife to work an outside job. On top of that the pension fund of the airline I worked for was raided by a "real capitalist pig" due to my employer's negligence in allowing themselves to be raided. Luckily I invested in MSFT,ORCL and INTC in 1989-92 or I wouldn't have been able to retire as I have but rather I would have had to go into another line of endeavor until I died. No "monopoly " lasts forever. We thought we had the franchise on the America's Cup but the Kiwis showed us otherwise. The Montreal Canadiens were once unbeatable as was UCLA in college basketball (perhaps if Wooden were there they still would be).That last example shows how one guy can make all the difference. There are no sure things in life save death and taxes and perhaps if you let the government take charge things will get worse. If MSFT has gotten to where they have so much power and money it was not because they always had the cash and dominance. They worked their way up. Their dominant position in the market place has not harmed the consumer as those that own their OS have a lot more software to use than those of us who own Macs. I have seldom heard any consumer complain about the price of MSFT's products (other than their competitors). The cpu's that run their OS are cheaper and have more horsepower. And given the instability of my Mac 8.0 and the horror stories concerning OS 8.5 corrupting its own hard disk MSFT may have to find another straw man to prop up. Maybe I should blame AAPL's poor management on MSFT; that is the fact that AAPL doesn't pour enough back into the company, that they won't license their OS, that they have odd ball interfaces etc. The rules in business today are what they have always been - firstest with the mostest. For example the L1011 was a great aircraft better than Boeing's or Douglas' offerings but it was a commercial flop. It failed because they charged too much and didn't get the market penetration and once the initial numbers were not what they had hoped for they backed off from improving it quickly and aggressively. Eventually they stopped making it. Life is a beach and then you die. JFD

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