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3.5 KiB
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25 lines
3.5 KiB
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<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" standalone="no"?>
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<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><title>FUD</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="../../jargon.css" type="text/css"/><meta name="generator" content="DocBook XSL Stylesheets V1.61.0"/><link rel="home" href="../index.html" title="The Jargon File"/><link rel="up" href="../F.html" title="F"/><link rel="previous" href="fuck-me-harder.html" title="fuck me harder"/><link rel="next" href="FUD-wars.html" title="FUD wars"/></head><body><div class="navheader"><table width="100%" summary="Navigation header"><tr><th colspan="3" align="center">FUD</th></tr><tr><td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="fuck-me-harder.html">Prev</a> </td><th width="60%" align="center">F</th><td width="20%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="FUD-wars.html">Next</a></td></tr></table><hr/></div><dt><a id="FUD"/><dt xmlns="" id="FUD"><b>FUD</b>: <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="pronunciation">/fuhd/</span>, <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="grammar">n.</span></dt></dt><dd><p> Defined by Gene Amdahl after he left IBM to found his own company:
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“<span class="quote">FUD is the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that IBM sales people
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instill in the minds of potential customers who might be considering
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[Amdahl] products.</span>” The idea, of course, was to persuade them to go
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with safe IBM gear rather than with competitors' equipment. This implicit
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coercion was traditionally accomplished by promising that Good Things would
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happen to people who stuck with IBM, but Dark Shadows loomed over the
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future of competitors' equipment or software. See
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<a href="../I/IBM.html"><i class="glossterm">IBM</i></a>. After 1990 the term FUD was associated
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increasingly frequently with <a href="../M/Microsoft.html"><i class="glossterm">Microsoft</i></a>, and has
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become generalized to refer to any kind of disinformation used as a
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competitive weapon.</p></dd><dd><p>[In 2003, SCO sued IBM in an action which, among other things,
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alleged SCO's proprietary control of <a href="../L/Linux.html"><i class="glossterm">Linux</i></a>. The SCO
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suit rapidly became infamous for the number and magnitude of falsehoods
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alleged in SCO's filings. In October 2003, SCO's lawyers filed a <a href="http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20031024191141102" target="_top">memorandum</a>
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in which they actually had the temerity to link to the web version of
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<span class="emphasis"><em>this entry</em></span> in furtherance of their claims. Whilst we
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appreciate the compliment of being treated as an authority, we can return
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it only by observing that SCO has become a nest of liars and thieves
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compared to which IBM at its historic worst looked positively
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angelic. Any judge or law clerk reading this should surf through to
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<a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/sco.html" target="_top">my collected resources</a> on this
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topic for the appalling details.—ESR]</p></dd><div class="navfooter"><hr/><table width="100%" summary="Navigation footer"><tr><td width="40%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="fuck-me-harder.html">Prev</a> </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="u" href="../F.html">Up</a></td><td width="40%" align="right"> <a accesskey="n" href="FUD-wars.html">Next</a></td></tr><tr><td width="40%" align="left" valign="top">fuck me harder </td><td width="20%" align="center"><a accesskey="h" href="../index.html">Home</a></td><td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> FUD wars</td></tr></table></div></body></html>
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