Stephen, looks like your message has created a very long thread.

Everyone here agrees that VFP is a great development tool. Unfortunatley,
Bill Gates did not create this product and it has had terrible marketing
efforts put forth on their part. Your are right in that he Redmond boys have treated this product as a "red headed step child".

Perhaps the best defense is a strong offense. What would the press
reaction be if all of us UT members put forth a few bucks and bought a
one page ad in say InfoWeek. Wasn't it InfoWeek that started the "Fox
is dead" rumor? If the ad was well thought out and stated our position
that Fox is a great development tool something like - "just thought we'd like to tell you VFP is a great product - paid by VFP developers". What would
the M$ boys reaction be? I suspect something like this has never been
done where the users actually pay for an ad because the product's owner
has neglected it. This would cause quite a stir in the trade magazines
and generate a lot of attention toward VFP - don't you think.

I suspect that a full page ad would cost a few thousand dollars but the
results could truly be astounding. My thought is to promote the positive
things about VFP (perhaps some web links to the EuroTunnel and Army Logistics
articles) not to be negative in any way. If the bottom of the ad states
that "this was paid for by VFP developers from the UT" it would go a long
way in making our case public.

What are your thoughts?


>We all know the strenths of FP, VFP and FB. M$ has taken the position to promote VB becasue it's easy to do.
>
>There are 30 fold developers in the VB camp to the FP one. If M$ does try to encourage more use of the product, what will they acomplish? Nothing.
>
>That includes lack of revenue. Because everyone knows that Access is not a development tool for multi user busniess apps, and for all those unlucky to have invested in it, SQL Server and all of it's licenses will fix the problem.
>
>Does VFP generate license revenue for M$. Not now. Will we bitch if they reverse that? Will that give M$ a position to measure VFP's position and strenth?
>
>Oh well let the flames begin!