News from ApacheCon US 2002

pdw writes "Apache Week this week has a feature detailing the happenings at last week's ApacheCon in Vegas. Read up to find out what's new in the world of Apache."

Comments

It's ironic...

[Whatsthiswhatsthis]

Isn't it ironic that ApacheCon is held at one of the few non-indian gambling meccas of the world? Why not ApacheCon on some indian reservation?

Re:Sun is helping Apache... but where is Sun going

[silvaran]

I believe Sun is having a hard time finding a direction, right now.

Maybe Sun has found their direction. I'm only speculating, but when Microsoft wants to improve their PR, they dump $100 million into India to fight AIDS. I look at Sun in a different light given their contributions to open source. Granted, their may be genuine interest by their employees to donate work and code to the open source community, which leads me to believe that this may not be simply a PR stunt. It's advantageous to Sun to be able to place their mark in software that they believe will eventually be in use by a great number of people (is that a run-on sentence?). I say bring it on. Whatever benefits us as a community benefits the whole, whether it's a group of individuals, or a giant corporation, donating their time and effort.

Re:Its all about the swag

[EvilAlien]

Are you saying they are wrong? Have you managed to articulate that in a meaningful way to your management?

If IT people can't pick out a "haha only serious" comment and realize that it is only half true (yes, we expect swag, no it is not the only reason we go), then it is a good indication of the dilution of the industry. In other words, if you don't know better, how can you expect your management to? If you can't give them a good reason why you should go, then you shouldn't go. Simple as that.

Vendors have marketing departments, and marketing people know that a key to getting market share is getting attention from consumers. This can be done with flashy ads, give-aways, informal dialogs over lunches, and other ways of getting mindshare previous to marketshare. Ultimately, vendors (usually) have to compete based on features, i.e., merit. However, getting someone to look at your product in more depth or showing a customer that you think of them often involves giving them a tshirt, a mug, or some other treat, whether that is pre- or post-sale.

I assumed people still knew all this, but maybe the industry is in such a depression that it has been forgotten... or maybe it has always been different up here in Canada.