Mark's point is well taken.  If we are trying to get HP senior management's attention, then spending all the money on an ad will have the most impact.  I doubt, however, that Lars was concerning himself with that issue when he made the suggestion.  I think he was thinking that charity would simply be a better use of our money and time.  The purpose of this thread is not to promote the HP3000 to potential customers.  That takes a well-planned campaign, not a single ad.  HP can do that job, and doesn't need us to pay for their advertising for them.  The idea was to call management's attention to the damage they do when they neglect to include MPE in their discussions of the operating systems they support.  I think maybe this thread has accomplished that goal.  We certainly know Winston has gotten the message (as if he needed to), and the persistence of this thread has probably given him much of the ammunition he needs to impress that point on others in the organization.  Maybe we don't need to go through with the WSJ ad to accomplish our goal.

These are just random thoughts.  Obviously, we can only guess at what is going on within HP's upper echelon.  Maybe we need to go through with this to prove we aren't crying wolf.  I just don't know...
 ----------
From: [log in to unmask]
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Wall Street or Charity?
Date: Friday, August 18, 2000 10:59AM

<<File Attachment: ENVELOPE.TXT>>
Ken after John after Donna after Lars:
>
> > I love it. It is constructive, yet makes the point.
> >
> > The trick, and the key, will be getting the business press to
> > cover the story and thus force HP management to respond.
> >
> > John (I've already contributed) Burke
> >
> > > Now imagine those people decide to not spend $150,000
> > > for a printed page of paper, but make up their minds and
> > > make that a donation for some charity, maybe asking the
> > > HPe3000 division manager to represent them for handing
> > > over the donation...
> > >
> > > Would Wall Street Journal consider a story about that?
> > > Or would they just be angry about losing a $150K deal?
>
> First of all kudos to Lars for thinking of this....   and I'm not at
> all against the idea in principal....  but....  let me play hard-
> nosed grinch for a moment;  and throw out another possible
> variant:

Forgive me too, for being curmudgeonly, but ...


We get better bang for the buck with all of it going to a
WSJ ad. The purpose (IMHO) is to raise the conciousness level
of the 3000, both in Carly's view and in John Q. CEO's view.
$150K to charity is really peanuts in the scheme of things.
Yes, it would deserve note somewhere, but as someone else
pointed out, it would probably only be a side note. Donating
the entire amount to bring equipment into schools, even
with matching funds would still not get the platform the
same exposure that a very simple and direct full page ad
in the WSJ would.

M. "speaking only for myself"