[nylug-talk] The future of Zimbra after Microsoft's bid for Yahoo!

[Ron Guerin]

Ruben Safir wrote:
>>>> Geeks may have trouble understanding it, but all consultants 
>>>> know when you show someone a mail program, one of the first questions 
>>>> they're going to ask is "does it do shared calendars?"  Telling them 
>>>> you've got some external or web app that does shared calendars pretty 
>>>> much drains the excitement out of the conversation.
>> I mostly agree with the above.  I would argue that buyers are not "braindead" 
>> per se 
> 
> That is mostly a mistake.  Getting the job done is not what is discussed
> in the room when decisions are made, and I've been in those rooms.  What
> they do is whip out sale brouchures, and run what they believe are the
> numbers, which in the case of exchange and outlook is almost free....minus
> the millions of needless dollars spent on unecessary maintence buy personel
> with little functional background...not to mention the cost in virus, spyware
> and dozens of other malware problems directly linked to Outlook Express.

I have to say, that when it comes to their Inboxes and their shared
calendars and their Blackberrys, much like their accounting software, it
really does matter if the job gets done.  I see it often enough what
happens when that job isn't getting done, and it's not pretty.

> Exchange really just sucks.... it sucks all the way and George, I swear if I didn't
> know better I'd had thought you to be a Microsoft paid troll with this conversation.

He's not wrong, Ruben.  Today's Exchange is nothing any administrator is
going to love, but its users don't curse the ground it was born on.  In 
fact I hear the users speak of it in glowing terms often.  Yes, they 
really do.

- Ron