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Sun's "Java Powered" Campaign
scapermoya writes "eWeek is reporting that Sun has started blitzing consumers , trying to increase public awareness about Java, with everything from accosting pedestrians to "Java Powered" logos begining to appear on some devices that are J2ME (Java 2 Media Edition) compatable. Tiny cup logos will now be pasted on everything from cell phones to microwaves." But not on Space Invaders clones.
Sun's a little slow, I've had one of these stickers on my coffee machine for ages.
Why would you blitz the general public? I don't think your average Mom walking down the street wants Java shoved at her unless it's in a cup and warm.
-Teiresias
Well Microsoft - or better: the vendors do this with every nearly every x86, printer, mouse, soundcard, usb stick, external harddrive.... nerly every piece of hardware sold today. I'm waiting for a tux- and an apple-sticker (sometimes you can see the "finder-face" on certified compatible hardware (like I already saw on some newer laserprintes)
Spelling mistakes: My is english spoken not tongue of mother.
....of 1998.
"We've got one million customers!"
"For what?"
"Our, er, free service. But I'm sure they'll give us money if we ask!"
The Army reading list
I feel sorry for all of the over caffinated students that are going to get branded when this is all over.
Well the onlly marketable named product Sun has right now is Java, and they are whoring out their youngest child for crack faster than you can say Sweet Zombie Jesus. I like Java, I really do, but it's alphabet soup family of products reads like intrest groups at gay pride parades. J2ME5, J2EE5, JDBC, JWS, JNLP, J2SDk,J2RE, etc. Maybe they should focus on their other marginally successful products like... umm.. well... umm...
There is nothing wrong with being gay. It's getting caught where the trouble lies.
From the article (a quote by Sun):
"When consumers see the name 'Java,' they understand that has stuff that makes it work better on the Internet."
That's just stretching it a little far. Java is (so far) a programming language, this JDS nonsense not withstanding. It only has stuff that makes it work better on the Internet if the developers design and code that stuff (using Java or something else).
I wonder if Sun is going to dilute its brand among developers (where the Java brand really buys them something) by pushing the brand into a consumer light. I can understand Sun's desire to have a strong consumer brand, and maybe it's easier to start with an existing brand than to build one from scratch, but I just think they're going the wrong direction with this. If they want a consumer brand, why not try to revive "Star" or just build from the ground up. IF they have something serious to offer consumers, building the brand shouldn't be that hard.
Last time I checked, J2ME is Java 2, Micro Edition, not Java 2 Media Edition. The point being that it is a very small virtual machine (as far as memory footprint and storage required)
"Give away the stone, let the oceans take and transmutate this cold and faded anchor." - Maynard James Keenan
Argh! A BASIC programmer! In English there is no such word as "goto." :-)
Stick Men
It's called brand awareness. The point here is to make sure that people (and in the case of mobile phones, young people) equate "Java" with "cool games" and an "i need it" attitude. In the end this will (hopefully) mean that in order to be able to sell a phone, you need to support Java. In turn, this means that MS will have a that much harder time trying to get everyone to use the mobile version of .NET.
In fact, here in europe we see this happening already. Every new phone that comes out has J2ME support, and when a phone doesn't have it is reviewed, it's always mentioned as a big minus point.
I suppose (hope) we'll see the same thing happen in the US.
By the way, didn't the latest MS "smartphones" have J2ME support these days?
> it is loosing developers at
> an extremely fast pace
Is it? Hm. To which languages? C#?
I'm doing lots of Ruby programming lately, but I'm still doing quite a bit of Java, too....
The Army reading list
Note: grousing about rejected Java game clones is Offtopic and usually gets moderated that way. It happens, don't take it personally.
Sehr geehrter Toilettenbenutzer!
The last time I looked at the numbers of Java developers, it was continuousily rising.
m l
But don't take my word for it:
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040629/221/eww5e.ht
> In English there is no such word as "goto."
Correct. He should have used "setjmp".
The Army reading list
Oh dear, you gotta love the irony.
No wonder the public is no clearer on what Java is than they are about .NET.
Sun have finally woken up to the fact that most consumers are tech-dreads not tech-heads. They fear tech more than they welcome it and as such need to be comforted when faced with unfamiliar grounds. Intel realised this years ago and have made sure that unless there's an 'Intel Inside' ("_DUM_.do de dum DEE!") sticker on the side, people will worry and say, "What's the pentuim? Will it work without an intel inside?" Prepare for the "Is your microwave/fridge/car/computer/watch/relational_dat abase caffinated?" campaign. FUD works.
:E) and big TV ads to promote your technology so people will say, "Hey what about Java? I'd like to have that." Essentially, to really sell a technology, no matter how good or bad it is, you have to play to the Pointy Haired Boss.
.NET get a publicity campaign or will it just be shoved down our throats with pictures of smiling actors staring into PC screens(which we can't see). They may regret not using that cup of tea. Then again Sun may regret all that money wasted on sticker that people thought were promoting a new decaf drink.
Java on mobile has increased the framework's profile a LOT, especially amoung younger phone buyers. Even my kid brother knows about java games, and he can barely use e-mail. Java seems to mean 'fun' in the minds of some. Well maybe not, but it means Something!
It must have finally clicked with Sun that people just won't magically get to know about java through the grapevine. You need stickers, Java Inside, Duke, Gosling's beard, hip coders(very hard to find
Of course Sun would LOVE to to foster the belief out there that unless it's got Java, it's worthless. "Has it got Java? Will it work without that coffe sticker?" It could happen. I wonder will Microsoft realise a similar campaign. One based on a cup of tea perhaps? I wonder will
Disclaimer: Java is Good. Garbage collection is Smart++.
May the Maths Be with you!
...all our stuff will look like NASCAR. First we have a label for the brand name. Then we had the label for the processor (Motorola, Intel, AMD, TI, etc). Then we had to get a label for the OS (MS Windows). Now we have the platform running on the OS. What's next? Maybe a label for the store that sold it to you. Or they could do a label for each company that preinstalls software on the device. They could even sell advertising space on the device.
I for one would like a plain white microwave instead of the Goldstar/Motorola/Windows CE/Lowe's labelled microwave. If I want to know what my microwave is running, I'll look it up.
A great example is another Java maker, Starbucks.... Very few people are willing to pay 3 bucks for plain, regular coffee from 7-11 or McDonalds, but may are willing to fork over 3 bucks if the coffee comes in a cup with a big green Starbucks logo.
Secondly, SUN is trying taking steps to improve its strategic position. Put yourself in SUNs position, your strongest product is JAVA. Appliances all over the world use JAVA, JAVA is taught in most colleges and universities, JAVA is widely used on the Internet, and most importantly (from SUNs point of view) JAVA isn't making SUN the money it could be.
If I were on SUN's team, my first step would ensure regular people (moms, dads, and non-slashdotters) realize how widespread JAVA is and how "good" it is for computing. Then I would ensure regular people associate JAVA with SUN. Thirdly, (to the dismay of most slashdot readers) I would use my JAVA = SUN association to make money.
SUN will be criticized for making moves to strengthen its position and SUN will be criticized for NOT making moves to strengthen its position, so ignore the critics, make solid technical and business decisions and do what every business was designed to do, make some money
Thoughts?
* Porter, M. Harvard Business School
I remember when J2ME first became popular and I heard 12 and 13 year olds sitting in the street talking about how their phones support "Java" and how that means that they can play games on it.
Similar things happened several times, and most of the time it was clear that none of them really knew what Java was or how it related to games or phones, it's just a name for a thing the phone does like "polyphonic ringtones" or "WAP".
Also, I would have trouble buying "Java Powered" unless the phone's core software was running in a JVM. "Runs trivial little games and applications using Java" isn't the same as "Wouldn't work at all without Java".
Um, no. They can take Java open-source, and still retain the rights to the BRAND Java. What's more likely is that they'll open-source parts of Java, but retain J2ME as commercially-licensed because that's where they see the real revenue coming from down the line.
"not applicable"? C#?
If you're moving from Java to C# then you've either:
1) Thrown out your Big Iron and spent an equivilent amount on a Windows cluster
2) Hired a bunch of people without checking if they knew the language your system is built on
3) Got paid off by Microsoft (ie: Uni. of Waterloo)
4) Decided you wanted something "easy" instead of something "stable"
C# is not applicable to jack shit compared to Java right now. Most core logic is done using J2EE. If it sucks, then you hired the wrong coders. Don't throw out the baby with the bath water. Java runs on some much bigger iron than C#.
These people must be developing piddly desktop apps that backend to something pseudo-enterprise. Works great in the lab... try scaling it out to 10,000 workers now. A company I worked for tried that. Told the poor bastards they contracted for that they'd have to buy twice the number of servers and upgrade to 2K Datacenter.
C# is the language of people who don't know how to fucking program. They like it because it works like VB for the GUI and alows them to do the stupid OO stuff they learned in intro to data structures. They are the ones who catch exceptions with blank handlers in Java at work. They are the ones who use a 3 meg C# app to do the work of a 30 line perl script.
Not that you can do anything about it, but I would guess that the reason why Java is having problems in your area is because it's becoming more populated with Microsoft nitwit apologists.
(And I would blame the University of Waterloo for selling out and thinking they're smarter than the rest of the world, allowing all the Canadians to think "If it's good enough for our best CS school, it's good enough for us!")
An example of this is how all the students at the local Universities are petitioning to have Java removed as the core programming language as they are complaining that is just not applicable enough compared to other languages such as C#.
.NET or MS users group until Microsoft actually PAID some students to start one! Now they are always have events sponsored by MS and bringing in new books paid for by MS to the library or just doing various pro-MS propoganda.
.NET user groups! That's like prostitution and shame on the student whores who work with MS on this!
Beware the Astroturf of Microsoft on campus!
My school never had anyone intrested in a
Now I'm not bitching about extra C# books in the library...what I am bitching about is Microsoft paying students to do things like "petition for the removal of outdated languages like Java from the curriculum".
MS couldn't keep up with real grassroots Linux and BSD groups on campus so they actually had to PAY for students to create MS and