____/ thad05@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on Saturday 08 December 2007 14:04 :
\____
> Roy Schestowitz <newsgroups@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>> I've also just realized that IDG (major press company) is owned by IDC. No
>> wonder the press is biased, but we already knew about the Gates Foundation
>> buying the press....
>
> For years I also didn't realize the connection between IDG and IDC,
> and I've actually done some writing for IDG.
>
> My experience with the big industry analysis firms is that they are
> wrong as much as they are right. Their track records are not much
> better than guessing, but they can be trusted to bury their mistakes
> and only point to their successes to create the illusion that they
> are infallible oracles. Their purpose is not really to predict or
> even really analyze, but to provide support for the decisions
> that business leaders have already made. It allows a CEO to
> show 'due diligence' when he goes ahead with that deal he already
> made with a handshake on the golf course.
>
> That being said, they do sometimes produce some good research if
> you can cut through the whitepaper spin and get access to the actual
> data. Of course with firms like Gartner and Forrester you typically
> have to pay a few thousand per report, so shlubs like us will have
> to settle on flinging the executive summaries around on COLA.
>
>> Dell Won't Preinstall Ubuntu Linux On Small-Business Computers
>>
>> ,----[ Quote ]
>> | Dell's refusal to sell Ubuntu machines to small businesses makes sense,
>> | because those customers typically want PCs that let them get to work right
>> | away. "It makes sense because the assumption is they want everything to
>> | work right out of the box," Richard Shim, analyst for IDC, said. "With
>> | something like Ubuntu, it's going to require some tinkering."
>> `----
>>
>> http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=200000030
>>
>> And they ended up with an egg in the face. Dell delivers to SMBs now
>
> The above is a good example of how the analysts often get it wrong.
> I remember some of the big players getting it waaaaay wrong in
> predicting the future of the Internet, email technology, and Linux
> on servers, so I take anything they say now with a pound of salt,
> even when it reinforces my own perceptions.
>
> Of course maybe I'll wake up tomorrow and the IP stack will be
> dead, we will all be running OSI protocols instead with X400/X500
> email and directory services (no SMTP), and linux will have been
> wiped from server rooms... and I will owe an apology to Gartner.
>
>>:)
>
> Thad
My dad told me the same thing a few years ago. In my eyes, analysts remain some
of the worst scumbags in the sense that they are paid to pass on corporate
messages and pretend that there is some real independent assessment behind
that.
I've had analysts attacking me in comments and also by E-mail, but it's them
who end up with an egg in the face. Who would sponsor independent research?
Even universities seems to have gotten corrupted in this way (a recent example
involves Microsoft paying an academic for anti-GPLv3 research, but very
quietly). Always, always, always follow the money... people don't /buy/
whitepapers until it's something that sells (and often paid for).
The analysts then pass on data to journalists who are associated with a sponsor
as well (the Gates Foundation has holdings), so here you have a nice circus
where $company pays sockpuppets like IDC to show that, _based on some measure
X_, $company is the best in the world. Then, $media_company, which is
sponsored in some way by $company, will takes the IDC study sponsored by
$company and bring it to the public's attention. It's brainwash. It's
propaganda.
I suspect Novell had one puppet in USB at the moment.
I hope you've had the chance to read the PDF in the OP (if you haven't seen it
before).
--
~~ Best of wishes
Beware the Windows box spewage (more commonly known as "spam")
http://Schestowitz.com | GNU is Not UNIX | PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
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