Microsoft Hatred FAQ

[Roedy Green]

On Thu, 27 Oct 2005 09:13:39 GMT, Roedy Green
<my_email_is_posted_on_my_website at munged.invalid> wrote, quoted or
indirectly quoted someone who said :

>To put this in perspective, IBM's salespeople made much nastier
>threats in their heyday.  Dick Toewes, head of Inland Natural Gas, was
>in charge of a tender for a new mainframe to do billing.  I was
>working on the Univac bid at the time.  He said that the IBM salesman
>said to him, "We know you have an eight year old little girl.  We know
>she walks along X street every day on her way to school.  It would be
>a terrible thing if somebody hurt her."

The tactic Univac/Burroughs/Prime used, at least for big sales, was
for example invite the potential customer to view some installation to
talk to a satisfied client about how they were using their gear. There
might be a convenient client in say ... Las Vegas.

The game then became to get the client to get drunk and laid and do
crazy things to help very uptight people cut loose.

On one of these trips, we ran through fields chasing fireflies.


-- 
Canadian Mind Products, Roedy Green.
http://mindprod.com Java custom programming, consulting and coaching.