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I have some anecdotal experience with this. I was at an Oracle event representing my company that managed Oracle for a very large number of customers. I met L

I have some anecdotal experience with this. I was at an Oracle event representing my company that managed Oracle for a very large number of customers. I met Larry. He treated me like I was an insignificant and why was I even talking to him. I considered that rude and highly dismissive. It became my goal to get our customers away from Oracle to which I had some success. Quite a few customers were able to move to MySQL which at the time was becoming more stable, more acid compliant and faster. We already had ridiculously fast hardware at that time anyway, not by today's standards. I would like to think it cost him at least a few of his racing yachts.

genericone 4y ago
Hell hath no fury like a customer scorned
- anakaine 4y ago
  How about when you piss off an entire state for your unethical practices? IBM banned from QLD. 10 years in and there's still no IBM contract within the state government that I'm aware of. https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-420969 https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-...
jasmer 4y ago
Larry has all sorts of questionable qualities, and there are plenty of reasons to leave (or use) Oracle, but some person being arbitrarily dismissive isn't really one of them. Unless the dismissiveness was over something very material. "I would like to think it cost him at least a few of his racing yachts." - because the CEO/Director of a massive multinational conglomerate with 100 000 employees didn't arbitrarily have time for you? Also - and this may have nothing to do with your experience - but for some reason some people feel as though they have the 'right' to other people's attention. The more influence people have the more people come out of the woods with this. I do not envy anyone with an iota of influence or popularity, it's a constant stream of people demanding their focus, any one of which may or may not interpret something some way, or even take an actual real slight out of proportion. Also I find that people are bad at interpreting the state of mind of others. Of course it's probably a good thing to move away from Oracle anyhow ...
- BizarroLand 4y ago
  I would counter that if you are at a networking function with your customers that you should consider yourself the face of your company and act accordingly. I don't blame them for developing a dislike for Oracle after an Oracle representative mistreated them. Their whole purpose in being there was to put face time in with past and future customers and engender positive connections and they failed.
  - Maursault 4y ago
    I would say two things were equally wrong in the OPs anecdote: one person was offensive, and one person was offended. While it seems just to entirely blame the offensive person, ego is a thing not good and taking offense is a choice. Unless physically striking someone, it is not possible to hurt someone's feelings. Feelings are important, no doubt, but feelings are entirely the responsibility of the feeler. One may have to think about where feelings come from and how they are actually caused to realize this. Every individual is responsible for their own actions and themselves, for their own body, and for their own body's releases of their own hormones, adrenaline, noradrenaline, cortisol, or whatever it is that is the actual functional cause of the feelings. Taking offense is just as bad as offending. Humility, ducks back, this is ideally what should occur when someone is offensive, but... of course, people should not be offensive, either, they should be kind and empathetic. No one is perfect, but if they have two cheeks, one always has the opportunity to emulate perfection. A lot of people are rude jerks sometimes, but rather than taking offense, we can choose to be awesome instead.
    - kranner 4y ago
      So if I call a Black person the N-word or address a Jewish person with an antisemitic slur, and this bothers them because it reminds them of how society has long dehumanised them and enslaved and murdered their peers simply for being born into that classification, etc, it is as much their fault for not having a handle on their hormones as it is mine for having said that thing? It may be the case that some of us can choose whether or not to be offended in any kind of circumstance, but that doesn’t prove everybody can, just like many people not simply being able to think themselves out of major clinical depression. It would be strange to blame them for this. Edit: grammar
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

genericone 4y ago

Hell hath no fury like a customer scorned

anakaine 4y ago
How about when you piss off an entire state for your unethical practices? IBM banned from QLD. 10 years in and there's still no IBM contract within the state government that I'm aware of. https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-420969 https://www.itnews.com.au/news/queenslands-ibm-ban-lives-on-...

jasmer 4y ago

Larry has all sorts of questionable qualities, and there are plenty of reasons to leave (or use) Oracle, but some person being arbitrarily dismissive isn't really one of them. Unless the dismissiveness was over something very material. "I would like to think it cost him at least a few of his racing yachts." - because the CEO/Director of a massive multinational conglomerate with 100 000 employees didn't arbitrarily have time for you? Also - and this may have nothing to do with your experience - but for some reason some people feel as though they have the 'right' to other people's attention. The more influence people have the more people come out of the woods with this. I do not envy anyone with an iota of influence or popularity, it's a constant stream of people demanding their focus, any one of which may or may not interpret something some way, or even take an actual real slight out of proportion. Also I find that people are bad at interpreting the state of mind of others. Of course it's probably a good thing to move away from Oracle anyhow ...

BizarroLand 4y ago
I would counter that if you are at a networking function with your customers that you should consider yourself the face of your company and act accordingly. I don't blame them for developing a dislike for Oracle after an Oracle representative mistreated them. Their whole purpose in being there was to put face time in with past and future customers and engender positive connections and they failed.
- Maursault 4y ago
  I would say two things were equally wrong in the OPs anecdote: one person was offensive, and one person was offended. While it seems just to entirely blame the offensive person, ego is a thing not good and taking offense is a choice. Unless physically striking someone, it is not possible to hurt someone's feelings. Feelings are important, no doubt, but feelings are entirely the responsibility of the feeler. One may have to think about where feelings come from and how they are actually caused to realize this. Every individual is responsible for their own actions and themselves, for their own body, and for their own body's releases of their own hormones, adrenaline, noradrenaline, cortisol, or whatever it is that is the actual functional cause of the feelings. Taking offense is just as bad as offending. Humility, ducks back, this is ideally what should occur when someone is offensive, but... of course, people should not be offensive, either, they should be kind and empathetic. No one is perfect, but if they have two cheeks, one always has the opportunity to emulate perfection. A lot of people are rude jerks sometimes, but rather than taking offense, we can choose to be awesome instead.
  - kranner 4y ago
    So if I call a Black person the N-word or address a Jewish person with an antisemitic slur, and this bothers them because it reminds them of how society has long dehumanised them and enslaved and murdered their peers simply for being born into that classification, etc, it is as much their fault for not having a handle on their hormones as it is mine for having said that thing? It may be the case that some of us can choose whether or not to be offended in any kind of circumstance, but that doesn’t prove everybody can, just like many people not simply being able to think themselves out of major clinical depression. It would be strange to blame them for this. Edit: grammar

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]