I like the idea that good programming is a search for Truth and the Right Way to solve a particular type of problem. What struck me is that good Marketing is a

I like the idea that good programming is a search for Truth and the Right Way to solve a particular type of problem. What struck me is that good Marketing is actually the exact same search. There are lots of bad programmers and lots of bad marketers (hard to say which are in more abundant supply). It may seem like there are more bad marketers, since we're more likely to be aware when we see "deceptions and half-truths" in sales/marketing... after all, we're very likely to be exposed to marketing in our daily life. When you get down to it though, a really good programmer and a really good marketer are both rare commodities. Marketing is not inherently more evil than programming. They are just both usually done poorly, and we all suffer as a result.