>>>I would be happy to see just one ad in one mainstream publication (not Fox mags)that validates VFP.
>>>
>>>Charlie
>>
>>I'd be satisfied with even less: a little PR in MS's own broadly circulated newletters. Who's going to take any marketing campaign seriously if MS keeps condemning VFP by conspicuous omission?
>
>This is partially up to us. Look for instance at the UT, we asked for our VFP, VB conference coverage to be on the MS VB page, and thanks to Robert Green, there it is.
>http://msdn.microsoft.com/vbasic/
>
>Val Matison asked for Foxteach to be listed in the Canadian MSDN newsletter mailing, and blam, there it was.
>
>If were are doing cool stuff with VFP, we have to let the world know. Check out www.dotnetwire.com and check out all of the VFP references.

Thanks for the excellent references, Evan. What a coup for UT to get such a great plug for VFP smack dab in the middle of the VB home page! I wonder if they'd have been able to pull that off if VFP had been mentioned in the title (which reads "VS Connections 2001 Report from Universal Thread"). This is stealth marketing at its finest!

I've never heard of www.dotnetwire.com before, but you've got to hand it to EPS and UT for doing a terrific marketing job, all things considered. But I can't help thinking of Mr. Subliminal whenever I see these kinds of marketing efforts. What the world hears between the lines is "but of course, MS is phasing out VFP", "you didn't heard any of this from Microsoft", etc. Surely the folks at EPS and UT are astute enough to see that they're in the same boat as the rest of us in the VFP proletariat. We can do our part, but without something more positive from the lips of MS, our own promotions come off as pretty lame.

I agree that it's partially up to us to do something about it, but my suggestion is that we focus on the problem of selling VFP to Microsoft before we further exhaust ourselves on crippled attempts to sell it to the rest of the world. I've got faith in Robert Green, but I think there's a limit to his influence, and he needs our help whether or not he's in a position to say that publicly. Have you noticed how regularly MS works in references to Visio in their newletters, not to mention the full page ads they've put in every major publication on the planet. That didn't steal much thunder from their .NET campaign. Now take away the expensive advertising, and just let MS give VFP the same kind of regular PR they give to their other products in their own newletters. That's what we should be asking for, or the rest is a waste of time.

Mike