[filmscanners] RE: Digital Darkroom Computer Builders?

["Laurie Solomon" <laurie@advancenet.net>]

>Some of their practices were illegal; the practice being discussed here is
not.

Many of the Enron practices were not illegal; those that were more often
than not had to do with reporting practices vis-a-cis the government and
shareholders which violated SEC rules.   The actual behavioral practices
that were being covered up may not have been kosher but they were not
illegal.  Where, when, and why Enron and other companies got burned was when
what they were doing became both public and the cause of a lot of people
losing a lot of money which produced a reaction which in Enron's case
destroyed them and in other cases cause some major problems for the
companies involved such as unwanted investigations, drops in stock prices,
and the firing of upper management personnel.

>I suspect the additional money they made as a result of such attitudes and
>practices far outweighed any consumer backlash.

You are probably right and I am inclined to agree with you on that point.
However, they did find it significant enough a problem to spend time and
money responding to the backlash  rather than ignoring it as they might if
they had no fear of any consequences.

>If this were not the case,
>there wouldn't be so many companies doing these things.

Here I disagree,  I think you are far to optimistic about the workings of
capitalism and rationality.  Many companies may very well be doing things
counter to their interests and which produces continual loses in revenues
out of inertia and stupidity even if it runs counter to rationality and
profits.  The assumption that these companies will eventially go out of
business or otherwise fail is usually an inaccurate presumption which
revolves in part around the imprecision and ambiguity of terms like
"eventually," the fact that we have no real standard of business failure
with respect to the corporate world in which mergers and takeovers exist
allowing what would have been failed and bankrupt organizatins to continue
on indefinitely by receiving infusions of capital from a profitable parent
or subsidiary in the corporate aggregation, and the fact that many of these
corporate operations have very deep pockets which can allow them to operate
a great loss for a long period of time while manipulating financial reports
so as to make them look good at the end of each quarter even though during
the quarter they were neither productive or profitable.

-----Original Message-----
From: filmscanners_owner@halftone.co.uk
[mailto:filmscanners_owner@halftone.co.uk]On Behalf Of Anthony Atkielski
Sent: Wednesday, October 23, 2002 6:09 AM
To: laurie@advancenet.net
Subject: [filmscanners] Re: Digital Darkroom Computer Builders?


Laurie writes:

> You may be right that it is a common practice;
> but that does not mean that it cannot come back
> to bite Microsoft.

The likelihood that it will come back to bite Microsoft is no greater than
the likelihood that it will come back to bite any other company that has
been doing it, and in the many decades of IT, I don't know of any cases in
which a company has suffered significantly from behaving in this way.

> Enron engaged in practices that apparently many
> Fortune 500 companies had been engaging in and
> it came back and bite them and a certain percentage
> of the other companies.

Some of their practices were illegal; the practice being discussed here is
not.

> Epson has exhibited similar attitudes and practices
> and has faced serveral consumer revolts by some of
> their heavy users as well as a lose in credibility
> with respect to their claims and literature.

I suspect the additional money they made as a result of such attitudes and
practices far outweighed any consumer backlash.  If this were not the case,
there wouldn't be so many companies doing these things.



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