Yet another unsolicited sales call at the office. So, who’s calling – oh, it’s RedHat?
“We thought you might be interested in RedHat Enterprise Linux and our JBoss middleware” says the sales drone. No, I respond, we are very happy with Debian and Perl. “Oh, you’re using Debian? And who do you call when it fails?” Wait, RedHat is using FUD to advertise its products? “FUD?” Yes, fear, uncertainty and doubt. “No, we’d never use FUD as a dumb sales approach.”
(Oh, so they are using FUD in a more intelligent way. I see.)
Could you please remove us from your sales list? “There is no list.” Then how did you call our company? “You don’t understand our sales approach.” Indeed, I don’t.
gnihihi…
Hi Hanno.
Let me first of all apologize for our behaviour. I will try to find out what happened here and will make sure you’ll not get a similar call in future.
However, using FUD is a bit strong IMHO. Red Hat’s differntiator is our support and services around open source. It is a valid point to mention when a sales drone pitches for a customer.
Calling that FUD is a bit over the top IMHO, but please do not take this as personal attack.
Again, my sincere excuses.
Jan Wildeboer
EMEA Evangelist, Red Hat
Hi Jan,
thanks for the response.
Calling that FUD is a bit over the top IMHO
I’m sorry, no, it definitely is a classic FUD argument.
Regards,
Hanno
I could see how this is considered FUD for someone looking to call it FUD. But you never did answer the question…. Who do you call when your software fails? Its been a long time since I worked in a place that even allowed software that was unsupportable….
When the stuff hits the fan, and peoples jobs are on the line why wouldn’t you want to be in bed with someone else?
Hi Mike,
I could see how this is considered FUD for someone looking to call it FUD.
FUD is defined as “a manifestation of the appeal to fear”.
Regards,
Hanno
FUD is defined as “a manifestation of the appeal to fear�.
So if you are confident in your solution and would have had a proper answer, there would not have been any fear. I guess it is the lack of answer or confidence that brings fear. Not the question itself…
I guess, fear is in the eye of the beholder
PS To me that question is a pure business/risk assessement question and there are many ways to reduce that risk, or downplay them if that is an option.