On 12/20/11 2:09 AM, Russel Winder wrote:
On Sun, 2011-12-18 at 03:57 -0600, Andrei Alexandrescu wrote:
[...]
It's quite amazing how many discussions a la "Java is successful
because..." completely neglect an essential point: one BILLION dollars
was poured into Java, a significant fraction of which was put in
branding, marketing, and PR.
Not all of it from Sun -- they didn't have pockets that deep.
The sheer fact that many of us - even those who actually _lived_ through
the Java marketing bonanza - tend to forget about it echoes many studies
in marketing: people believe they are making rational and logical
choices and refuse to admit and understand they are influenced by
marketing, even when they fall prey to textbook marketing techniques.
Corollary: You have to have new product on the shelves every 6 months
or people stop buying your product. Just look in the supermarket
shelves for the use of "new". The product may be the old product but
the packaging is different so it is "new".
Confusion. Product != brand. There doesn't have to be a new brand to
replace Starbucks or Coca-Cola every six months.
Andrei
