Just following prior practice. When Daley went on the warpath, he didn't file suit against gun dealerships, he went after the manufacturers. That's where the real money lay. Although, in this case, going after BestBuy, etc., might be a more enticing proposition than some 2-bit ammo dealer in Chillicothe. Either way, he'd have a good-size target.
I do agree with your WB logic example. Why they would even consider this is beyond belief. But the fiscal situation here is pretty dire. Nothing surprises me lately with our state gov.
My $.05--what this really is trying to do is to set up a legal basis for pursuing some kind of monetary "damages" from game manufacturers for failure to enforce the law.
As tin-foil-hat as the above sounds, considerthe lousy financial condition of the state as well as some rather quixotic efforts by Chicago mayor Daley to sue the gun manufacturing industry for similar damages, I wouldn't put it beyond possibility.
While not quite as bad as California, our budget is a mess, thanks to years (decades?) of cronyistic state business procedures and pork-laden public works. Anything additional to fill the till is fair game. And it's not like the majority of the public here will object.
As other posters have mentioned, Gov. Chipmunk has a less-than-stellar record in his brief term of office for stimulation and support of business growth. This won't really affect the (nonexistant) game developers market in the Land of Lincoln. But it's a pretty clear signal to any businessman with a clue that IL will consider any line of business fair game for "revenue augmentation". That isn't going to be particularly helpful for us.
Without wading further into the debate...an inaccuracy needs correction. Teresa Kerry does not have any significant influence, if any at all, in Heinz operations. The Heinz family (she was married previously to one of the family) mostly cashed out of the operation in the mid-90's.
A quick review of the major holders of company stock would appear to confirm she has no material link to the company. So, whatever you think of the company's actions/attitudes towards sourcing, she doesn't appear to have any weight in forming them...
Guess I should have been clearer--the comment was in jest, referring to Eisner's not-so-great track record of decision making recently. It wasn't intended as a literal statement.
Curious--are they using it for IT as well as on their creative side?
Problem is that barratry as defined, requires a action to be initiated. The mere threat of action does not appear to constitute it. Hence my question re: "tortious interference" in the original post--could the threat of an action be construed as causing remediable damage? Apart from the nuisance factor, of course.
I'm not myself aware of any jurisdiction that would accept the threat of a lawsuit as grounds for a barratry tort. To which do you refer?
The explanation behind utility cost and risk motivating SCO's strategy is excellent, both in concept and explanation. Kudos.
I don't know if I agree with you re: the mechanics of AZ's liability insuror forcing IBM to indemnify AZ at this point in time. AZ isn't on the hook for anything right now, other than some legal fees. There's nothing for the insuror to make good on currently. So I would imagine they'd take a wait-and-see on whether the action progresses or not, and how it's appearing to progress in the future. If SCO wants to vamp legally for the next who-knows-how-many months/years, well, AZ's lawyers aren't going anywhere.
Pragmatically, I don't know if AZ's management is going to want to deal with SCO and IBM's respective legal teams simultaneously.
The exception to the above would be if AZ's management/shareholders start seeing this as a significant managerial distraction and press for a resolution. I would concede the pressure you describe would be possible in this case--but not from the insuror's point of view.
IANAL, but have worked with enough of them to at least speculate on your question...
As others have posted, simply threatening a lawsuit is not, per se, illegal. The actual content of one's public communications regarding legal action is open to scrutiny, however. If the language is incendiary enough, the threatened company could make a case for basic libel/slander/defamation. Whether this would hold up in court is debatable--and the offending language would have to be pretty extreme to warrant a successful tort prosecution, IMHO. However, the folks lobbying these "poison pen" letters probably aren't going to be scared too much by a little counter-suit for defamation... (grin)
One aspect I would be interested in hearing a Real Lawyer's perspective on would be if "tortious interference" could be applied to a company like Infinium in this case. I am aware no proceeding has actually been filed--but do the principles guiding this apply in the absence of an action? Just curious.
Absolutely agree with the long-term benefits and even a few of the short-term ones.
That said, no one on either side of the issue seems to have a plan for how to ease the displacement and transition those affected people into these new "better" jobs.
Pro-multinationals expound benefits and the broad horizon of "better" jobs for Americans. Great, and I'm all for that--but what are those jobs? Not a whole lot of speculation or identification of these. If this isn't dealt with, these are going to turn into the economic equivalents of Iraq WMD--everyone knows they're there, but no one seems to be able to find them when it would most benefit them. Worse still, absolutely no one promoting multi-national work has any sort of plan for how to deal with the real disruption of real lives, with real consequences. C'mon folks, someone tell me something about training, support during displacement, the things those affected by this need to hear.
The anti-multinationals are even worse--blind, reflexive resistance to an economic force that, better or worse, is going to run it's course regardless of whether we like it or not. What are these people doing to lobby and advocate for the training, support and assistance the displaced are going to need?
Hey, I'm all for better, sustainable work and a career that builds on what I've already done, rather than locking me into a single competency. So somebody start defining what that is, how I get there, and, if the cost is my immediate employment, what support I have to get there.
Right now the answer to the above seems to be: "You're on your own, because no one has a clue." If that's the best the pro-multinationals can come up with, is it any wonder so many people are knee-jerk opposed to this?
It seems obvious that if IBM knew that these chemicals were causing higher cancer rates among its employees that it ought to be found complicit...
Well, gee sure. Problem is that you assume: a) the chemicals were actually causing higher rates & b) IBM was away of the causality. Those are pretty big assumptions. I'd prefer to see something from the transcript supporting both of these assumptions before I hop onboard.
It is IBM who through their ignorance caused this damage. I feel that it is their responsibility to pay.
2. And now you jump from the above two to an emotionally resonant, but logically suspect conclusion.
Should they, through no fault of their own be destined to spend many thousands of their own dollars for cancer treatment when they are in the least capable position of paying of any of the parties involved?
3. [Emphasis added.] Now, we're getting somewhere. So, since IBM has obviously deep pockets, they should be on the hook for treating these folks, even though no causality has been demonstrated? Uh, no. Just because they're rich doesn't mean they automatically get the bill.
Look, I know what those people are dealing with right now, from unpleasant personal experience. And my heart goes out to them. And I sincerely hope that they find an effective treatment and support for what is surely a very unpleasant quality of life right now. But nothing written or referenced so far indicates that it's IBM's fault they took ill, or that IBM managed some nebulous consipiracy to hoodwink it's workers as to possible dangers of the work they did. And for the amount of restitution for this supposed tort that took place, I'd darn well want to see ironclad proof that both of the above took place, not just emotional manipulation by a legal team and press. If you find supporting evidence in the transcript, I'd certainly be willing to re-consider my opinion. My guess, however, is that if 12 jurors didn't find this, you probably won't either.
Have fun w/ the Democrats, in any event.
{Commencing karma burn...}
Re:philosophical puzzlement
on
Practical C++
·
· Score: 4, Funny
They want a slick Cameron Mackintosh production that is uniform, standardized, and reliably the same whether you see it in London, New York, or Kalamazoo. This technology delivers that product.
In my opinion, the only (and I truly mean _only_) ray of sunshine in the whole mess is that, should this technology succeed in connecting with audiences, long-suffering theatre aficiaonodos stuck outside the big performance hubs may finally be able to hear a production with something vaguely resembling the sonic impact of the original scoring.
Most often, once a musical leaves one of the major performance centers, the accompaniment becomes two synth players playing 4-staff transcriptions/condensations of the original scoring, a bass player and a percussionist. Since productions need the abilit to alter tempi, dynamics, etc., you don't dare sequence parts (at least before now)--so you end up hearing only what those four hands can output themselves on the keyboard. They sound like high school productions, for God's sake.[1]
For those audiences, sinfonia may actually be a (slight) improvement, as it allows some quasi-organic elements to be conveyed to listeners, while allowing the instrumental personnel enough control over a broader virtual orchestral context to make the process of presenting it to a listener something less complex than DiffEQ.
That said, I'm still offended by the prospect of $100+ theatre tickets featuring a canned soundtrack. For that price I want the goddamned Cadillac-class production.
[1] Before the flames commence...I have absolutely nothing against high-school productions. Many of them, however well-meaning, tend to run understandibly short of students willing/capable of performing the orchestral parts, which leads to a lot of pianist/drummer-type pit orchestras and a pretty thin sound as an understandable result. God bless 'em, in any event.
Except that every escrow agreement I've ever worked with specifies that should the business entity being contracted with by the buyer should cease doing business, the escrow would be unlocked. Just transferring ownership of the asset would not satisfy the "ongoing concern" language of these agreements. So they'd still open up anyway.
I will have to gather some data points to back this up, but my impression is, successful or not, quite a bit of software IP and money change hands during liquidation, so I stand by my original assertion.
Given enough time, some of these products end up becoming the software equivalents of the unwanted fruitcakes we receive in December, constantly being bounced from one insolvent company to another.
You're right they may not blossom post-liquidation. But there's still plenty of people willing to take the chance for (to them) reasonable prices. And post-liquidation-release source escrow would pretty much destroy any value to be gained from such transactions.
I absolutely agree that doing this would benefit any company buying software.
But the net effect of requiring this escrow for general-use software (read: not a custom job for the client) would be to devalue most software company's assets in the event of a liquidation. When liquidating, companies look to realize as much value as possible from whatever assets they possess at the time. This usually takes the form of an IP sale.
In such a case as you describe, no external company would be motivated to bid for a insolvent company's software assets--why, when they're most likely going to go open immediately upon formal dissolution of the original owner?
This implied de-valuation removes a significant hedge strategy from the hands of start-ups and would be entered into reluctantly, at best, by all but the largest, most well-established companies. I wouldn't ever expect to see your idea widely adopted.
A shame, though--it really does benefit the people shelling out those big checks for these systems....
You have obviously not seen the large-size block kits they make available for young ages. While still requiring adult supervision (I've learned from experience with my own kids that anything smaller than an elephant represents a potential choking hazard), they seem to be very well-regarded by the very, very young.
Both my boys started banging around with the large blocks pretty much as soon as they were able to start gripping things. And they picked up on the "snap together" approach pretty quickly. Granted, most of the resulting designs represent a, shall we say, 'non-Euclidean geometry' view of the world, but they just love putting them together.
Many of the parents we know say they've seen the same things w/ their kids. So they might be onto something...:)
The only real winnners, it's been proven over and over, are the ones who buy stocks of companies that provide real value and hold on to them long term.
(sigh--kiss my karma goodbye, but...)
Absolutely wrong. You obviously don't deal with arbitrage specialists, short-sellers, contrarians, professional bears and the like. They seem to do pretty well financially.
The fascination with the market as a wealth-generating device arises from, among many many other factors, the ability to make money ("win") using a variety of different techniques. Consistently successful investors rely on a mix of investment strategies, some involving buy-n-hold of a variety of different classes of securities, other strategies involving more volatile involvement.
Your statement has a high degree of "warm fuzziness", but is not supported by the whole of investment behavior.
Spoken language orthography has nothing to do w/ programming syntax. If the language tokenizes left-to-right, that's how you edit it in the source file.
Or, put another way, what is "right" supposed to be? Harmonious development teams working together? Producing One True Codebase? Taking over the corporate world? All of the above?
As others have pointed out, one would be hard-pressed to find any "closed" source market that doesn't suffer from the same points he lists. Firms/People compete, often have conflicting visions on how best to solve a problem, often duplicate effrots, etc., etc., So, strike the "Open Source" and replace with "Software Development" in the title.
Slightly offtopic mini-rant: articles like this only serve to highlight the current abysmal state of technology media reporting. Come on guys--spend some of that time you devote to rehashing simplistic opinions and poorly formed chains of login and try to dig up the next big thing in tech instead. Write something that's useful. Geez.
While I'm on the (off-)topic: better yet, if the people penning these screeds really are interested in promoting open source development and just have to keep writing op-ed's, as opposed to real investigative/background stories, they should start publishing coherent explanations of why corporate use of open source is a rational and economically wise strategy in today's business world, with arguments structured to effectively resonate with business decision makers, not technologists. So many technology decisions are won by the likes of Microsoft, Oracle, etc., due to an effective TKO--there's no one in the other corner with business credibility counter-punching, or, better yet, throwing the first punch.
(And before the counterstorm of protest on the above--ESR, RMS, Bruce, etc., are eloquent and knowledgeable. But the average CIO doesn't know them from Snoopy. Or worse, thinks of them as "those long-hair, arrogant, typical tech weenies". It sure ain't fair, but the head guys are going to need someone with demonstrated business street cred pitching the arguments for them to work effectively.)
Slashdot Mirror
And I, for one, welcome our new aquarian overlords...
Just following prior practice. When Daley went on the warpath, he didn't file suit against gun dealerships, he went after the manufacturers. That's where the real money lay. Although, in this case, going after BestBuy, etc., might be a more enticing proposition than some 2-bit ammo dealer in Chillicothe. Either way, he'd have a good-size target.
I do agree with your WB logic example. Why they would even consider this is beyond belief. But the fiscal situation here is pretty dire. Nothing surprises me lately with our state gov.
My $.05--what this really is trying to do is to set up a legal basis for pursuing some kind of monetary "damages" from game manufacturers for failure to enforce the law.
As tin-foil-hat as the above sounds, considerthe lousy financial condition of the state as well as some rather quixotic efforts by Chicago mayor Daley to sue the gun manufacturing industry for similar damages, I wouldn't put it beyond possibility.
While not quite as bad as California, our budget is a mess, thanks to years (decades?) of cronyistic state business procedures and pork-laden public works. Anything additional to fill the till is fair game. And it's not like the majority of the public here will object.
As other posters have mentioned, Gov. Chipmunk has a less-than-stellar record in his brief term of office for stimulation and support of business growth. This won't really affect the (nonexistant) game developers market in the Land of Lincoln. But it's a pretty clear signal to any businessman with a clue that IL will consider any line of business fair game for "revenue augmentation". That isn't going to be particularly helpful for us.
Since he claims that "all power comes from [his] father", wouldn't he be more of a proxy object?
Without wading further into the debate...an inaccuracy needs correction. Teresa Kerry does not have any significant influence, if any at all, in Heinz operations. The Heinz family (she was married previously to one of the family) mostly cashed out of the operation in the mid-90's.
A quick review of the major holders of company stock would appear to confirm she has no material link to the company. So, whatever you think of the company's actions/attitudes towards sourcing, she doesn't appear to have any weight in forming them...
Guess I should have been clearer--the comment was in jest, referring to Eisner's not-so-great track record of decision making recently. It wasn't intended as a literal statement.
Curious--are they using it for IT as well as on their creative side?
Yes, I have heard of it.
Problem is that barratry as defined, requires a action to be initiated. The mere threat of action does not appear to constitute it. Hence my question re: "tortious interference" in the original post--could the threat of an action be construed as causing remediable damage? Apart from the nuisance factor, of course.
I'm not myself aware of any jurisdiction that would accept the threat of a lawsuit as grounds for a barratry tort. To which do you refer?
John:
The explanation behind utility cost and risk motivating SCO's strategy is excellent, both in concept and explanation. Kudos.
I don't know if I agree with you re: the mechanics of AZ's liability insuror forcing IBM to indemnify AZ at this point in time. AZ isn't on the hook for anything right now, other than some legal fees. There's nothing for the insuror to make good on currently. So I would imagine they'd take a wait-and-see on whether the action progresses or not, and how it's appearing to progress in the future. If SCO wants to vamp legally for the next who-knows-how-many months/years, well, AZ's lawyers aren't going anywhere.
Pragmatically, I don't know if AZ's management is going to want to deal with SCO and IBM's respective legal teams simultaneously.
The exception to the above would be if AZ's management/shareholders start seeing this as a significant managerial distraction and press for a resolution. I would concede the pressure you describe would be possible in this case--but not from the insuror's point of view.
You're assuming that Eisner and his band of mouse-heads have the intelligence to order Linux used by Disney in the first place...
IANAL, but have worked with enough of them to at least speculate on your question...
As others have posted, simply threatening a lawsuit is not, per se, illegal. The actual content of one's public communications regarding legal action is open to scrutiny, however. If the language is incendiary enough, the threatened company could make a case for basic libel/slander/defamation. Whether this would hold up in court is debatable--and the offending language would have to be pretty extreme to warrant a successful tort prosecution, IMHO. However, the folks lobbying these "poison pen" letters probably aren't going to be scared too much by a little counter-suit for defamation... (grin)
One aspect I would be interested in hearing a Real Lawyer's perspective on would be if "tortious interference" could be applied to a company like Infinium in this case. I am aware no proceeding has actually been filed--but do the principles guiding this apply in the absence of an action? Just curious.
Absolutely agree with the long-term benefits and even a few of the short-term ones.
That said, no one on either side of the issue seems to have a plan for how to ease the displacement and transition those affected people into these new "better" jobs.
Pro-multinationals expound benefits and the broad horizon of "better" jobs for Americans. Great, and I'm all for that--but what are those jobs? Not a whole lot of speculation or identification of these. If this isn't dealt with, these are going to turn into the economic equivalents of Iraq WMD--everyone knows they're there, but no one seems to be able to find them when it would most benefit them. Worse still, absolutely no one promoting multi-national work has any sort of plan for how to deal with the real disruption of real lives, with real consequences. C'mon folks, someone tell me something about training, support during displacement, the things those affected by this need to hear.
The anti-multinationals are even worse--blind, reflexive resistance to an economic force that, better or worse, is going to run it's course regardless of whether we like it or not. What are these people doing to lobby and advocate for the training, support and assistance the displaced are going to need?
Hey, I'm all for better, sustainable work and a career that builds on what I've already done, rather than locking me into a single competency. So somebody start defining what that is, how I get there, and, if the cost is my immediate employment, what support I have to get there.
Right now the answer to the above seems to be: "You're on your own, because no one has a clue." If that's the best the pro-multinationals can come up with, is it any wonder so many people are knee-jerk opposed to this?
Boy, where to begin...in no particular order:
It seems obvious that if IBM knew that these chemicals were causing higher cancer rates among its employees that it ought to be found complicit...
Well, gee sure. Problem is that you assume: a) the chemicals were actually causing higher rates & b) IBM was away of the causality. Those are pretty big assumptions. I'd prefer to see something from the transcript supporting both of these assumptions before I hop onboard.
It is IBM who through their ignorance caused this damage. I feel that it is their responsibility to pay.
2. And now you jump from the above two to an emotionally resonant, but logically suspect conclusion.
Should they, through no fault of their own be destined to spend many thousands of their own dollars for cancer treatment when they are in the least capable position of paying of any of the parties involved?
3. [Emphasis added.] Now, we're getting somewhere. So, since IBM has obviously deep pockets, they should be on the hook for treating these folks, even though no causality has been demonstrated? Uh, no. Just because they're rich doesn't mean they automatically get the bill.
Look, I know what those people are dealing with right now, from unpleasant personal experience. And my heart goes out to them. And I sincerely hope that they find an effective treatment and support for what is surely a very unpleasant quality of life right now. But nothing written or referenced so far indicates that it's IBM's fault they took ill, or that IBM managed some nebulous consipiracy to hoodwink it's workers as to possible dangers of the work they did. And for the amount of restitution for this supposed tort that took place, I'd darn well want to see ironclad proof that both of the above took place, not just emotional manipulation by a legal team and press. If you find supporting evidence in the transcript, I'd certainly be willing to re-consider my opinion. My guess, however, is that if 12 jurors didn't find this, you probably won't either.
Have fun w/ the Democrats, in any event.
{Commencing karma burn...}
Why, it's companion book, of course:
Abstract C++ Programming
They want a slick Cameron Mackintosh production that is uniform, standardized, and reliably the same whether you see it in London, New York, or Kalamazoo. This technology delivers that product.
In my opinion, the only (and I truly mean _only_) ray of sunshine in the whole mess is that, should this technology succeed in connecting with audiences, long-suffering theatre aficiaonodos stuck outside the big performance hubs may finally be able to hear a production with something vaguely resembling the sonic impact of the original scoring.
Most often, once a musical leaves one of the major performance centers, the accompaniment becomes two synth players playing 4-staff transcriptions/condensations of the original scoring, a bass player and a percussionist. Since productions need the abilit to alter tempi, dynamics, etc., you don't dare sequence parts (at least before now)--so you end up hearing only what those four hands can output themselves on the keyboard. They sound like high school productions, for God's sake.[1]
For those audiences, sinfonia may actually be a (slight) improvement, as it allows some quasi-organic elements to be conveyed to listeners, while allowing the instrumental personnel enough control over a broader virtual orchestral context to make the process of presenting it to a listener something less complex than DiffEQ.
That said, I'm still offended by the prospect of $100+ theatre tickets featuring a canned soundtrack. For that price I want the goddamned Cadillac-class production.
[1] Before the flames commence...I have absolutely nothing against high-school productions. Many of them, however well-meaning, tend to run understandibly short of students willing/capable of performing the orchestral parts, which leads to a lot of pianist/drummer-type pit orchestras and a pretty thin sound as an understandable result. God bless 'em, in any event.
Stock transaction, not cash. In effect, they're purchasing Disney with market goodwill.
:)
Not that I don't agree about lowering the monthly charges, of course...
Except that every escrow agreement I've ever worked with specifies that should the business entity being contracted with by the buyer should cease doing business, the escrow would be unlocked. Just transferring ownership of the asset would not satisfy the "ongoing concern" language of these agreements. So they'd still open up anyway.
I will have to gather some data points to back this up, but my impression is, successful or not, quite a bit of software IP and money change hands during liquidation, so I stand by my original assertion.
Given enough time, some of these products end up becoming the software equivalents of the unwanted fruitcakes we receive in December, constantly being bounced from one insolvent company to another.
You're right they may not blossom post-liquidation. But there's still plenty of people willing to take the chance for (to them) reasonable prices. And post-liquidation-release source escrow would pretty much destroy any value to be gained from such transactions.
I absolutely agree that doing this would benefit any company buying software.
But the net effect of requiring this escrow for general-use software (read: not a custom job for the client) would be to devalue most software company's assets in the event of a liquidation. When liquidating, companies look to realize as much value as possible from whatever assets they possess at the time. This usually takes the form of an IP sale.
In such a case as you describe, no external company would be motivated to bid for a insolvent company's software assets--why, when they're most likely going to go open immediately upon formal dissolution of the original owner?
This implied de-valuation removes a significant hedge strategy from the hands of start-ups and would be entered into reluctantly, at best, by all but the largest, most well-established companies. I wouldn't ever expect to see your idea widely adopted.
A shame, though--it really does benefit the people shelling out those big checks for these systems....
'Zero' may be a bit of an exaggeration, but...
:)
You have obviously not seen the large-size block kits they make available for young ages. While still requiring adult supervision (I've learned from experience with my own kids that anything smaller than an elephant represents a potential choking hazard), they seem to be very well-regarded by the very, very young.
Both my boys started banging around with the large blocks pretty much as soon as they were able to start gripping things. And they picked up on the "snap together" approach pretty quickly. Granted, most of the resulting designs represent a, shall we say, 'non-Euclidean geometry' view of the world, but they just love putting them together.
Many of the parents we know say they've seen the same things w/ their kids. So they might be onto something...
The only real winnners, it's been proven over and over, are the ones who buy stocks of companies that provide real value and hold on to them long term.
(sigh--kiss my karma goodbye, but...)
Absolutely wrong. You obviously don't deal with arbitrage specialists, short-sellers, contrarians, professional bears and the like. They seem to do pretty well financially.
The fascination with the market as a wealth-generating device arises from, among many many other factors, the ability to make money ("win") using a variety of different techniques. Consistently successful investors rely on a mix of investment strategies, some involving buy-n-hold of a variety of different classes of securities, other strategies involving more volatile involvement.
Your statement has a high degree of "warm fuzziness", but is not supported by the whole of investment behavior.
Spoken language orthography has nothing to do w/ programming syntax. If the language tokenizes left-to-right, that's how you edit it in the source file.
And don't even get me started on '\t'...
They'll probably claim that '\cr' is a derived work and demand royalties anyway...
This is just step #2 in their master plan. The final claim will be ownership of the '\n' character.
Or, put another way, what is "right" supposed to be? Harmonious development teams working together? Producing One True Codebase? Taking over the corporate world? All of the above?
As others have pointed out, one would be hard-pressed to find any "closed" source market that doesn't suffer from the same points he lists. Firms/People compete, often have conflicting visions on how best to solve a problem, often duplicate effrots, etc., etc., So, strike the "Open Source" and replace with "Software Development" in the title.
Slightly offtopic mini-rant: articles like this only serve to highlight the current abysmal state of technology media reporting. Come on guys--spend some of that time you devote to rehashing simplistic opinions and poorly formed chains of login and try to dig up the next big thing in tech instead. Write something that's useful. Geez.
While I'm on the (off-)topic: better yet, if the people penning these screeds really are interested in promoting open source development and just have to keep writing op-ed's, as opposed to real investigative/background stories, they should start publishing coherent explanations of why corporate use of open source is a rational and economically wise strategy in today's business world, with arguments structured to effectively resonate with business decision makers, not technologists. So many technology decisions are won by the likes of Microsoft, Oracle, etc., due to an effective TKO--there's no one in the other corner with business credibility counter-punching, or, better yet, throwing the first punch.
(And before the counterstorm of protest on the above--ESR, RMS, Bruce, etc., are eloquent and knowledgeable. But the average CIO doesn't know them from Snoopy. Or worse, thinks of them as "those long-hair, arrogant, typical tech weenies". It sure ain't fair, but the head guys are going to need someone with demonstrated business street cred pitching the arguments for them to work effectively.)
OK, time for my medication...