Paul,

>
> Perhaps being on the leading edge is a negative for many people.

People in the US are very concerned about anything new - unless they're
more interested in having their names in magazine articles than keeping
their jobs. We're beginning to see new customers here - for a long time
most US IBPhoenix customers came with us from Borland in 2000. They
still come from Borland (generally) but we are beginning to see new faces.

> The point about the quality of the
> community was not intended to knock somebody else, but as a quality
> of FB that I personally appreciate.

My concern there is the perception that "free" support (how ever
friendly) is worth what you pay for it - or less - and that paying a
commercial company for support on products they sell is a better
guarantee of success. You and I know that's not true, but it is widely
believed. Our message needs to address the question of "if there's a
problem, where do I go?"

>
>>lets look at ways to convince people to use Firebird who
>>would otherwise not consider an open source database.
>
> That suggests that OS databases share a collective positioning that
> sets them apart from proprietary db's with a collective positioning.

To some extent, we do. We provide enabling technology, free, to help
software developers create excellent, affordable solutions. Well, MySQL
doesn't, but the others mostly do.

> Although being open source is an important benefit of Firebird, it is
> only a small part of the total benefit. We compete just as much with
> MSSQL as with MySQL as with Sybase, etc.

Right. We want to establish that we're the adult among the open source
databases - reliable, long commercial experience, complete, etc.

>
> ... Another route is to target the
> multitude of niche "vertical" solution providers and convince them of
> the idea that their sell to the final user gets a lot easier if they
> switch their product to FB.

Almost all verticals want a way to demo their product without requiring
a license for the underlying data storage engine. Firebird is a natural
for that slot, particularly in its embedded configuration.

Regards,


Ann