by Casualties of war?
How does that fit with Annie Get Your Gun?
Annie Get Your Gun is a fictional musical loosely based on Annie Oakley, an American sharpshooter born in 1860, and her husband, Frank Butler. In Act II of the musical, Annie and Frank are planning to get married. Annie wants a big wedding, while Frank wants a small wedding. They decide to resolve the conflict by having one last duel to decide how they will proceed. In the musical, this leads into the song “Anything you can do” (I can do better).
How does this relate to technology?
Well, the thing that got me started thinking about this blog post, primarily has to do with the back and forth on Twitter and blogosphere from the likes of NetApp, EMC, and recently HP.
I’m not going to name names, because that’s not what is important. What is important, is how life reflects art. Here are a few comparisons that illustrate what I mean:
| Annie/Frank | Storage Vendors |
| Expert Sharpshooters | Enterprise Storage Vendors |
| Have many talents (listed in the song) | Provide a wide variety of features and options |
| Wants to get married | Wants to provide the best storage for customers |
Experts
In the musical, both Annie and Frank are expert sharpshooters and very capable people. For everything one can do, the other says that they can do better. It is not that one is truly better than the other, they are both experts. They are both top of their game. No one can dispute that.
The Goal
In the musical, the end goal is getting married. Now I don’t foresee NetApp, EMC, and HP (or any combination of) getting “married”/merging/etc. I do see the goal for the storage vendors to provide the best products ad services for all customers.
In the end, Annie lets Frank win to calm the waters so they can get on with their end goal of getting married. Who is going to calm the waters?
The Casualties
I see a couple casualties in this war of words.
- The storage vendors
I understand that people are passionate about their products… Sometimes at the expense of appearing unprofessional. - The virtualization community
People that know/work with parties on both sides can be put in a crossfire when one is pit against another…
It is odd to see one or more vendors say they are “fierce competitors” and also “good friends” while seeing this back and forth about products and their capabilities. Some of this has really gotten downright dirty.
I would like to see things calm down… Maybe we can setup a virtual DMZ and come to a peace accord or something.
When attacks appear personal it gets a lot worse. If it can just be kept out of the personal space, left to the facts, and discussed with an “appropriate” amount of passion… Maybe it could end up simply being a spirited debate.
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