----- Original Message -----
From: "Phil Payne" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Monday, March 31, 2003 2:40 PM
Subject: Re: CIO network article


> > Yup. But you can run Linux on that standard processor. The author's
target
> > audience will (maybe? probably? certainly?) assume that he means that
Linux
> > can't run "all by itself" on a z900.
> >
> > No big deal. Just normal press stuff at which to poke fun.
>
> I think it's a pretty tiny nit to pick at.  The key messages link Linux
with the mainframe,
> leave the impression that it's a thoroughly practical thing to do, and the
article closes with
> IBM's "unique selling proposition" for the mainframe - that it doesn't
break.
>
> I've worked with journalists for over twenty years -
> http://homepages.tesco.net/~Phil.Payne/index.html - and I've been amazed
on many occasions at
> how close they can get to the nub of the issue very quickly.
>
> Before you castigate the reporter for a tiny oversight, remember that
every article they write
> goes through sub-editors who know NOTHING about ANYTHING.  I have seen
reporters in tears - I
> have had reporters call me in advance of publication to apologise for the
galley proof
> distortions of their stories that they've just been presented with.

Ya, sometimes I nit-pick just "because it's there." So, perhaps I should
heed this admonishment?:

   To speak down of others is a dishonest and indirect way of
   praising oneself; let us be above such transparent egotisms.

...and save my nit-picking for code reviews, where it might actually
benefit.

-jcf

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