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Oracle 10g launch

Inspite of not feeling too well, I took the metro to Downtown DC to attend Oracle 10g launch. Reached there promptly by 8:45 AM - the registration was scheduled for 9 AM.

• About 450 people were there.
• Way too many marketing folks.
• Quite a few representatives from Oracle partners too.
• As if Oracle’s sales force was not enough, there were people from other vendors who have no affiliation with Oracle (as far as I can see), trying to corner people who don’t belong to any of these categories.
• Government employees were hot property! Everyone wanted to know when they plan to upgrade.

The hot air - literally and due to sales howling - was little more than I could stand. After about an hour, I couldn’t bear my head ache and got out. OTN is a better way for me to evaluate and analyze 10g.

It may be just my perception, but I got a feeling that the folks sporting the Oracle badge were not really interested in their products. I didn’t sense a feeling of pride or enthusiasm. To be fair, most of my previous meetings with Oracle employees have been with technical people. All of them were passionate about the things they do. It is hard for marketing people to understand the passion engineers feel; and to reproduce it. (I hate to say this) In July, I met some Microsoft staff - none of whom were technical; but all of them were very passionate about what they do. Though, I don’t necessarily agree with some of their beliefs, such outlook registers well with a customer.

One question I wanted to ask --but didn’t, because of the early departure-- was about Oracle’s product release cycles. I think new versions are coming out at waaaay short intervals. Core enterprise databases and applications based on them are not the things I want to keep upgrading every other year. There should be atleast 3 years between major versions of most enterprise software. That will give people 2 years to work on their systems and use 1 year to keep up with the technology. Since few people will invest in Oracle products for making simple things, I think we need atleast 4.5 years between product launches. Even Microsoft gives 3 years between different versions of desktop products.

Note: Oracle’s software business may be down, but they should definitely start a subsidiary for catering. After registration, I was sent to a breakfast hall. I didn’t have breakfast, but the tables would’ve put Obelix’s Gaulish Banquet to shame.

1. Good comment about the Oracle marketing policy and their sseminars as I was planing to attaind the same type of seminar but I think I must drop that india.
   

   Posted by: Bhushan Walde on October 21, 2003 06:25 PM