Please don't change Beastie to another crap logo such as

[Anthony Atkielski]

Robert Marella writes:

> As far as the codebase question, he was not the one to bring it up. If
> I can read between his lines, I understand that when you go in front
> of the suits you can't tell them RTFM. You have to explain why FreeBSD
> is head and shoulders above the leader of the pack.

Yes.  Things to remember if you must present FreeBSD to "suits" (not an
exhaustive list):

- You must provide sound arguments and/or hard data to support your
suggestions.  "FreeBSD is just great!" will not do.

- You must provide costs.  "It's free" won't do.  Nothing is ever free.
 If you don't have costs, either you aren't being serious, or you
 haven't done your homework.

- You cannot killfile anyone who asks questions that you don't like.

- Calling the suits stupid because they refuse to unconditionally agree
with you guarantees failure.  Do not throw tantrums.

- You must be confident, but not arrogant.  Stick to your guns when you
are discussing something that you know to be objectively true, but do
not argue about opinions.

- You must know exactly what point you wish to make to the suits, and
you must stick to it.  A long discussion of how much you love Beastie
will not impress.

- You need to leave documentation with them, including a copy of your
presentation.

- You need to explain how they will obtain support when something goes
wrong.  "Nothing ever goes wrong!" will not work.

- You need to explain how FreeBSD will fit in with their IT strategy.
It's up to you to research this; it is not up to them to figure it out.

- Don't knock the competition unless you can objectively back up what
you say (even then, be judicious).

- Be prepared to address legal issues, such as licensing, patents, and
copyrights.

- If you say "If you don't like it this way, go somewhere else," they
will.

> The Suits hold the purse strings. They read the newspaper. They see the
> advertisements. They hear the hype. They say, "We were thinking of an MS
> solution. Why would we use FreeBSD? What is wrong with Linux as an
> alternative".

Yes.

-- 
Anthony