[Info-vax] IPSec - Dear God in heaven NO!

[JF Mezei]

Bill Gunshannon wrote:

> People in this group have long demonstrated an inabilty to read "the
> writting on the wall".  But then, how could they be expected to see
> it with their heads buried so firmly in the sand.


I don't see it that way. I think people here have seen the writing on
the wall for a LONG LONG time, but kept hoping someone would manage to
erase it and put a more positive message on the wall.

And I think that we have pretty much underestimated HP's PR abilities on
how to manage VM expectations.  Unlike Compaq that gave the community a
heart attack when it murdered Alpha without warning, HP has simply
allowed VMS to grow old without needing to send negative messages about it.

Back in the DECUS days, if Digital had announced it was pulling out of
DECUS conferences, there would have been protests to no end, people
chaining themselves to the ZKO building sign etc etc. But when HP
announced there was to be no bootcamp anymore, the reaction was very
muted because the customer base just isn't surprised by that news
anymore, it is the type of stuff we have come to expect.


What is happening is that people are now realising that HP isn't going
to fix/revive VMS and that it will simply maintain it until it isn't
profitable t maintain it anymore.

So the hopes of seeing the writing on the wall be erased/changed are
going away rather quickly.


Say HP were to announce tomorrow that it will stop development of VMS
and just maintain/patch it to fullfill contractual obligations, I
suspect the community would be somewhat lethargic since it would
surprise nobody. And that means that a smaller percentage of the
remaining customers would institute "don't ever buy from HP again"
policies, which means that HP would be able to convert more VMS
customers over to other HP products which as been HP's goal all along.

The best the community can hope for is to increase the number of
customer who will not stay with HP when HP announces bad news about VMS.