If you use the term "leadership" in the sense of market leadership then you
are right. But you were talking about architectural leadership. I don't
think the two are the same. Technical followers are often market leaders.
Michael Kay
Software AG
home:
work:
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Didier PH Martin [mailto:]
> Sent: 30 April 2002 20:15
> To: ;
> Subject: Re: [xml-dev] A market view
>
>
> Hi Michael
>
> Didier said:
> > > If the last three market segments are limited to a few
> > > thousand or less than
> > > 100 000, then its obvious that the architecture promoted by
> > > the java and
> > > Microsoft world leads the world. They create the
> mainstream trends.
>
> Michael replied:
> > No, the numbers game tells you who the followers are, not
> who the leaders
> > are. There are always more followers than leaders.
>
> Didier replies:
> It depends on the perspective you are taking. If you mean
> that people using
> Java or Microsoft tools are followers, then you are right
> (based on this
> logic). I do not understand why you say "no" to the above
> statement since it
> simply means that the type of architecture (the subject)
> promoted by the
> Microsoft and Java world (complement) leads (the verb
> associated to the
> subject: the architecture) the world. Said differently, the
> architecture
> preferred by the many outweighs the one preferred by the few.
> Maybe I didn't
> expressed my idea very well and you got confused by the word
> "promoted". I
> meant here that, within the market place, when a product
> cross the chasm,
> people base their buying decision on the product used by others. The
> numbers, in that sense, reflect the acceptance a product (an
> architecture)
> receives from the market place. The numbers provides a
> "promotion" effect to
> the product/architecture. Example of that statement: Windows
> vs. OS2 ,
> Apache vs. IIS. This is a phenomenon Regis McKenna [1] calls
> the word or
> mouth effect, other have called that the network effect. In
> fact a whole
> sector of economics is about this topic (network economics).
> It basically
> state that the more people are using a particular product,
> the more this
> product will sell. This is also known in sociology or in
> behavioral finance
> as the herd effect. I hope, this time I was more clear. Sorry
> for having
> badly expressed my mind.
>
> Cheers
> Didier PH Martin
>
> [1] Relationship Marketing (successful Strategies for the Age of the
> Customer). Regis McKenna.
>
