> What FireBird needs, is more Marketing, look at the MySQL web site, with
> every minor change,
> they put a news on the web, making people think that they invented the

hype.

> I'm an editor for linux
> at a Macedonian IT Magazine and one of the maintainers of the Macedonian
> Linux Portal (linux.net.mk),
> personaly i'd love to write news about FB, but i don't have clue what to
> write about because the site wasn't changed
> in the last 2 months. If there was just a bit material to make noise about
> and more news on the FB web, then FB
> could gain more publicity, all the news should be also forwarded to
> slashdot, newsforge, ...etc

IBPhoenix tries to track everything that is happening in the firebird
community on a regualr basis, and attempts to keep its site updated with
this news on a regualr basis.... its true that the Firebird site doesn't
change as often perhaps as it should, but then again it is entirely
maintained by volunteers.

> Maybe IBPhoenix should consider forming a Marketing department (if they

have

> one, they should get rid of those people
> immediatly)

Hmmm how useful - sure we can create a marketing department, we sort - of
have one - but he's somewhat busy now - supporting customers, adding new
fixes to the ODBC driver, updating the website, commenting on the lists etc.
However - marketing people don't directly generate income and since
marketing typically eats money and resources without generating directly
tangible results, I think we skip the hiring of half a dozen marketing
people for the time being.

This is the fundamental - whatever your opinions on what is good for
Firebird in marketing terms, marketing takes $'s and resources. Neither
IBPhoenix nor Firebird have the resources or the $'s. Unlike MySQL - there
is no commercial version of the software available... so all $'s that flow
in are based on support contracts - resource and time intensive or on the
sale of CD's (we have sold some, but the number is not a realistic
correlation between the number of users and units sold.).

We are always happy to talk to the press, other people - whatever - but they
typcially have to come to us, we can't afford to hire a PR company.

> Marketing is the key to FireBird's success, not the features it has or
> lacks. If you have good Marketing, you could even sell hot water :)

If there is someone out there who would like to become the Senior Vice
President for Marketing for Firebird on an annual salary of $0.00 + 0
benefits + 0 budget then I would be very happy to work with them.

Regards
Paul