[Info-vax] DECdirect, was: Re: BASIC compiler in the hobbyist distribution

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In article <518aacc1-0da5-4c33-969d-6455cee2645b at googlegroups.com>, johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk writes:
>On Saturday, 30 May 2015 09:49:52 UTC+1, johnwa... at yahoo.co.uk  wrote:
>> On Saturday, 30 May 2015 09:30:39 UTC+1, Paul Sture  wrote:
>> > On 2015-05-29, Simon Clubley <clubley at remove_me.eisner.decus.org-Earth.UFP> wrote:
>> > > On 2015-05-29, johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk <johnwallace4 at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:
>> > >>
>> > >> Wrt
>> > >> "Simply having your customers call up a sales representative to buy
>> > >> a US$100 software license and get a paper package printed and mailed
>> > >> and then typed into some registration mechanisms just isn't
>> > >> cost-effective for anybody involved, but I digress."
>> > >>
>> > >> DECdirect UK, and reportedly in Europe too, managed to do pretty
>> > >> much that. Together with manufacturing in Ayr (Scotland) and Software
>> > >> Supply in Galway (Ireland), they had LEAN systems before anyone even
>> > >> knew what LEAN was. End user orders a MicroPDP/VAX one week, Ayr custom
>> > >> build it, customer gets it the next week. Software and documentation
>> > >> produced on demand, not from stock. 
>> > >>
>> > >> DECdirect UK even did outbound marketing, e.g. via the DECdirect
>> > >> catalogues for high volume hardware and software (which looked
>> > >> nothing like the DECdirect US catalogue, fwiw). They contained
>> > >> articles for stuff that *could* be high volume, if people only
>> > >> knew about it. DECdirect UK software revenue went from zero to
>> > >> $USM100+/yr in the space of 18 months.
>> > >>
>> > >
>> > > For the benefit of Hoff:
>> > >
>> > > http://www.computinghistory.org.uk/big/2304/DECdirect-Software-Catalogue/
>> > >
>> > 
>> > April 1989 - "Software from the world's No. 1 in networking"
>> > 
>> > Who would have though that less than a decade later they'd be swallowed
>> > by Compaq?
>> > 
>> > -- 
>> > I don't know what the language of the year 2000 will look like, but I
>> > know it will be called Fortran.                    -- Tony Hoare 1982
>> 
>> I don't know who would have seen Compaq as a purchaser, but quite
>> a lot of people could see that things weren't going well. Lots of 
>> talk from corporate HQ of being "poised for growth" while the red
>> ink, brown envelopes, constant re-organisations and workforce
>> reductions were going on in many places. 
>> 
>> One of the notable spots for me in the UK was when the company
>> decided that it's account group directors (for manufacturing,
>> telecom, finance, defence, etc - that title may not be the actual
>> one but it is close) needed to be more entrepreneurial (dynamic,
>> responsive, etc).
>> 
>> So what actually changed? On the whole the same people had the
>> same Account Group Director jobs, with the same organisation
>> around them and the same products and services in the portfolio,
>> but their job title was changed from Account Group Director to
>> "Entrepreneur". Guaranteed to work, right?
>> 
>> One of these days I really must have another go at reading
>> "DEC is dead, long live DEC" and see how well it matches what
>> I observed (from a long way from HQ, at least geographically).
>> http://www.decalumni.com/pdf/DEC_book_Press_Release.pdf
>
>All of which was meant to lead up to the point that VSI, outside
>of the dead hand of the corporate emperors, have a chance to
>show that they actually understand what entrepreneur means.
>
>And I forgot to trype it. Never mind.

Trype?  Is that the new social communication fad based on beef stomach?

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