Microsoft targetting ColdFusion

While skimming through the lists I noticed an ad. Now this is not news to anyone as there are ads on all of the pages in a nice, not so forceful manner. What was interesting about this ad was the text. The title was simply "Coldfusion". The text for the ad: "Order Visual Studio 2005 Kit. Simplify software development." And who was the ad by? www.microsoft.com Now you have to understand how adsense works (beyond reading the articles we have on it in Fusion Authority). When there is a really high paying ad, it will 'force' out the lower paying ones. This means that if there are 2 high paying ads, then only those 2 will be shown. When there is only one ad, then that ad is either very high paying or there just isn't any other ads for the page (never a problem on House of Fusion). So when Microsoft has the only ad on a page and the page content is purely ColdFusion, you know they want us. Now I wonder if Visual Studio 2005 has ColdFusion editing capabilities or are they just using the trademarked word ColdFusion to target us? Weren't there just some lawsuits won about using search terms that have nothing to do with the actual ad and where the display term was a trademark? Looks like more fun to come. :)   

A few years ago my company bought a large number of server licenses from Macromedia. Some client (CF Studio, Flash, DW) licenses, too. A couple of years later when VS Studio.NET first came out, Microsoft sent a fully licensed copy of VS Studio.NET Architect edition addressed to me at my office. The retail value of that package at the time was around $2,300, if I recall correctly. Coincidence? I think not. I have no way of knowing for sure, but I would be willing to wager that the large volume license purchasers of CF got the same deal I did. You have to admire MSFT as a competitor. They are totally relentless. As for the net effect? We've all certainly heard of shops that have dropped CF in favor of .NET, but we have also seen a lot of new entrants into the CF market, esp. since CFMX came out. I am amazed at the vigorousness and seriousness of the CFMX programming community these days. Frameworks, serious debates on the value of MVC, Ajax, CFFORM-based RIAs- we are seeing a new wave of really, really cool stuff built around ColdFusion. What gets me going the most is when I see young software developers who are serious about their craft building advanced stuff in CF. It's great! From a business standpoint, MSFT has done a great job convincing corporate managers to go with .NET, but what about developers? All I see is open .NET jobs going unfilled because people don't have the skills. And unlike Java, C/C++, PHP, Perl, and CF, you have to run Windows to run .NET, and I believe that has locked out a lot of developers from countries like India and China. Developers who want to learn CF can download CFEclipse (they probably already have the Eclipse platform), download a developer copy of CFMX server, and go to town. If I had any advice to give to MACR, it would be to encourage that kind of behavior as much as possible, because developers in Asia (with 50% of the world's population) are the market for sustained future growth. As to the search term thing, MSFT has great lawyers. They might argue that ColdFusion is a valid search term for them to advertise precisely because it is a competing product in their space. I did a bunch of other Google searches for languages. ColdFusion pulled up the VS Studio ad. So did JSP. Other searches- Java, Perl, PHP, J2EE, Python- turned up nothing special. Clearly there is no profit to be had in beating up on free competitors like PHP and Perl, and J2EE seems to have missed the cut because MSFT is targeting people searching for the language, not the platform. The scripting wars continue. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----   

Those are good points, however even with a staff of experienced CF developers my old company made the choice to go to .NET The main reason was because that is what our clients wanted. None of them had heard of CF, however they had heard of Java and .NET When we went to outsource some of development to an Indian firm, they all knew .NET, we couldn't find anybody that was able to do CF. There were Java Developers. A few years ago my company bought a large number of server licenses from Macromedia. Some client (CF Studio, Flash, DW) licenses, too. A couple of years later when VS Studio.NET first came out, Microsoft sent a fully licensed copy of VS Studio.NET Architect edition addressed to me at my office. The retail value of that package at the time was around $2,300, if I recall correctly. Coincidence? I think not. I have no way of knowing for sure, but I would be willing to wager that the large volume license purchasers of CF got the same deal I did. You have to admire MSFT as a competitor. They are totally relentless. As for the net effect? We've all certainly heard of shops that have dropped CF in favor of .NET, but we have also seen a lot of new entrants into the CF market, esp. since CFMX came out. I am amazed at the vigorousness and seriousness of the CFMX programming community these days. Frameworks, serious debates on the value of MVC, Ajax, CFFORM-based RIAs- we are seeing a new wave of really, really cool stuff built around ColdFusion. What gets me going the most is when I see young software developers who are serious about their craft building advanced stuff in CF. It's great! From a business standpoint, MSFT has done a great job convincing corporate managers to go with .NET, but what about developers? All I see is open .NET jobs going unfilled because people don't have the skills. And unlike Java, C/C++, PHP, Perl, and CF, you have to run Windows to run .NET, and I believe that has locked out a lot of developers from countries like India and China. Developers who want to learn CF can download CFEclipse (they probably already have the Eclipse platform), download a developer copy of CFMX server, and go to town. If I had any advice to give to MACR, it would be to encourage that kind of behavior as much as possible, because developers in Asia (with 50% of the world's population) are the market for sustained future growth. As to the search term thing, MSFT has great lawyers. They might argue that ColdFusion is a valid search term for them to advertise precisely because it is a competing product in their space. I did a bunch of other Google searches for languages. ColdFusion pulled up the VS Studio ad. So did JSP. Other searches- Java, Perl, PHP, J2EE, Python- turned up nothing special. Clearly there is no profit to be had in beating up on free competitors like PHP and Perl, and J2EE seems to have missed the cut because MSFT is targeting people searching for the language, not the platform. The scripting wars continue.

Why would your clients dictate what language they want their solution written in? And were there no CF programmers available on contract, for example, to hand over development to? ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

I know - I had the same reaction. Any client who comes to me saying they want X language would worry me. They should be concerned with Y results. Also, if a client asked for j2ee, or said j2ee was ok, then why would CF _not_ be ok?? ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

I imagine that there are many reasons a client might want a specific language.  Perhaps one day they envision bringing the application in-house, and want to buy the code.  Perhaps they've had bad experiences with one language or another.  Perhaps they have a partnership with MS and feel that they can get a higher level of service with one over the other. It's either do it the client way or don't do it at all, isn't it? Matthew Small I know - I had the same reaction. Any client who comes to me saying they want X language would worry me. They should be concerned with Y results. Also, if a client asked for j2ee, or said j2ee was ok, then why would CF _not_ be ok?? ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

True, good points. I guess I always feel a little red flag go up when the client asks for a particular language. I'd want to know why up front. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

> Matthew  wrote: > I imagine that there are many reasons a client might want a specific > language.  Perhaps one day they envision bringing the application in-house, > and want to buy the code.  Perhaps they've had bad experiences with one > language or another.  Perhaps they have a partnership with MS and feel that > they can get a higher level of service with one over the other. > Yeah or maybe they want the app to run on their in-house environment or their IS dept  requires certain standards.

And maybe they are a part of Microsoft's covert intelligence operations - they infiltrate companies all over the world, making executive decisions to move to Microsoft, thereby destroying all competition. It actually sounds plausible. Matthew Small > Matthew  wrote: > I imagine that there are many reasons a client might want a specific > language.  Perhaps one day they envision bringing the application in-house, > and want to buy the code.  Perhaps they've had bad experiences with one > language or another.  Perhaps they have a partnership with MS and feel that > they can get a higher level of service with one over the other. > Yeah or maybe they want the app to run on their in-house environment or their IS dept  requires certain standards.

Yeah, but a lot of our clients were Universities, They didn't really care if it were MS, or j2ee so long as they didn't have to buy/support another application server they were happy. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

Yeah, pretty much. Most clients didn't really care, however, some of them were pretty particular, for instance, the app would be running on their servers, and they didn't have a CF server, nor did they want one. But they had a simple windows server, and could run .NET When you do Apps that will be installed on the client's server, they want something simple to install. A compiled .NET app works very well for that. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

Well, the client didn't so much dictate it the actual language, however a compiled language where the code wasn't on the server was a major reason. And for a number of things the apps did, .NET was a good fit. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

Michael,     How do you get paid for the ads that show-up?  For the ad being displayed?  A click? A purchase? If you get paid or paid more for clicks then I think maybe we should all start clicking on the MS ads on your sites. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more ----- While skimming through the lists I noticed an ad. Now this is not news to anyone as there are ads on all of the pages in a nice, not so forceful manner. What was interesting about this ad was the text. The title was simply "Coldfusion". The text for the ad: "Order Visual Studio 2005 Kit. Simplify software development." And who was the ad by? www.microsoft.com Now you have to understand how adsense works (beyond reading the articles we have on it in Fusion Authority). When there is a really high paying ad, it will 'force' out the lower paying ones. This means that if there are 2 high paying ads, then only those 2 will be shown. When there is only one ad, then that ad is either very high paying or there just isn't any other ads for the page (never a problem on House of Fusion). So when Microsoft has the only ad on a page and the page content is purely ColdFusion, you know they want us. Now I wonder if Visual Studio 2005 has ColdFusion editing capabilities or are they just using the trademarked word ColdFusion to target us? Weren't there just some lawsuits won about using search terms that have nothing to do with the actual ad and where the display term was a trademark? Looks like more fun to come. :)    Confidentiality Notice:  This message including any attachments is for the sole use of the intended recipient(s) and may contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is prohibited. If you are not the intended recipient, please contact the sender and delete any copies of this message.

I get paid on a per click basis with the amount varying based on the ad. Please don't click on an ad unless its something your interested in. While I appreciate the desire to help out HoF, clicks for clicking sake can actually hurt us in the long run. Would someone advertise on HoF if they knew their ads were just going to be used as click fodder? Work anyone advertise on any site? Efficient web advertising that works without being annoying is helping grow more web industry, or at least I think so. >Michael, >    How do you get paid for the ads that show-up?  For the >ad being displayed?  A click? A purchase? > > >If you get paid or paid more for clicks then I think maybe we should all >start clicking on the MS ads on your sites.

> And maybe they are a part of Microsoft's covert > intelligence operations - > they infiltrate companies all over the world, making > executive decisions to > move to Microsoft, thereby destroying all competition. > It actually sounds plausible. > Matthew Small I could see that happening theoretically with some really large companies... Lockheed, Hershey, Cocacola & Pepsi Co., Bank of America, Sony... s. isaac dealey   954.522.6080 new epoch : isn't it time for a change? add features without fixtures with the onTap open source framework http://www.fusiontap.com http://coldfusion.sys-con.com/author/4806Dealey.htm

> Michael, >     How do you get paid for the ads that show-up?  For the > ad being displayed?  A click? A purchase? > > If you get paid or paid more for clicks then I think maybe > we should all > start clicking on the MS ads on your sites. Copy the link, stick it in a cfhttp tag and schedule it to run every few seconds... preferably through a proxy server. :) s. isaac dealey   954.522.6080 new epoch : isn't it time for a change? add features without fixtures with the onTap open source framework http://www.fusiontap.com http://coldfusion.sys-con.com/author/4806Dealey.htm

Doesn't the click have to match the impression? ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

Definitely don't do that. Big Brother Google is watching. :) I have to start podcasting and teach people the true meaning of paranoia on the web. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

Meaning? Iirc you can pass the http_referer info in a cfhttp request ... and probably any other info needed to fake it. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more ----- s. isaac dealey   954.522.6080 new epoch : isn't it time for a change? add features without fixtures with the onTap open source framework http://www.fusiontap.com http://coldfusion.sys-con.com/author/4806Dealey.htm

Well if in the DB they have only delivered that ad to the site 50 times, however there are 100 clicks, then wouldn't that be a little odd? > Meaning? Iirc you can pass the http_referer info in a cfhttp request > .... and probably any other info needed to fake it. > > > Doesn't the click have to match the impression?

> Well if in the DB they have only delivered that ad to the > site 50 times, > however there are 100 clicks, then wouldn't that be a > little odd? Not necessarily... I suspect they not only allow but are grateful for if not expect their ads to be cached for a certain period of time on the server where the ad is delivered -- it eliminates a great deal of bandwidth usage both for them and for the site delivering the add... Of course, I could be way-off base, but since every other syndication technology I've seen encourages (or demands) some form of caching, I'd be surprised if Google simply said "SUCK OUR BANDWIDTH DRY! WE DON'T CARE! CRASH OUR SERVERS WITH A GROTESQUE AMOUNT OF TRAFFIC!" s. isaac dealey   954.522.6080 new epoch : isn't it time for a change? add features without fixtures with the onTap open source framework http://www.fusiontap.com http://coldfusion.sys-con.com/author/4806Dealey.htm

As the ads are all contextual, then theres little they can do cache wise. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

Well, as an advertiser I get reports on impressions and clicks, so I'd be a little skeptical that I had a number of clicks that didn't jive with the number of impressions. I would think somebody is using me to increase their profits, or cause me to lose mine. ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more -----

I haven't advertised with google... recently... but given the amount of money MS has obviously put into the add, and the average click-through rates generally being so low, I'd expect it'd take a lot of clicks before the folks at MS even noticed... You know, tons of impressions at 2% click-through... 5,000 clicks later it goes up to 2.5%... (random numbers chosen for emphasis)... granted, it's all sort of moot anyway as I really was just joking about setting it up as a scheduled task. :) ----- Excess quoted text cut - see Original Post for more ----- s. isaac dealey   954.522.6080 new epoch : isn't it time for a change? add features without fixtures with the onTap open source framework http://www.fusiontap.com http://coldfusion.sys-con.com/author/4806Dealey.htm

> As the ads are all contextual, then theres little they can > do cache wise. Umm... on the end where the add is presented? Of course there is ... there are loads of ways you could cache those... s. isaac dealey   954.522.6080 new epoch : isn't it time for a change? add features without fixtures with the onTap open source framework http://www.fusiontap.com http://coldfusion.sys-con.com/author/4806Dealey.htm