Klarinet Archive - Posting 000576.txt from 1999/11

From: Tony@-----.uk (Tony Pay)
Subj: Re: [kl] Dichotomitis
Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1999 02:50:56 -0500

On Sun, 14 Nov 1999 18:07:57 GMT, I said:

> On Sun, 14 Nov 1999 09:52:24 -0800 (PST), leupold_1@-----.com said:
>
> > > On Sun, 14 Nov 1999 08:59:56 EST, GrabnerWG@-----.com said:
> >
> > > > If there were no profit, investors would (and do) take
> > > > their money and put it somewhere else... I might add this.
> > > > In the long run, without quality, you will have no profit.
> > > > Without profit, you will have no business.
> >
> > Tony Pay responded:
> >
> > > So they're sufficiently intertwined that you don't want to oppose
> > > these two things in a discussion. Or even accord them *relative*
> > > importances. As a friend of mine recently pointed out about a
> > > related dichotomy, the nature/nurture dichotomy -- to speak of 30%
> > > nature and 70% nurture is like talking about a lock and key
> > > mechanism that is 30% key and 70% lock.
> >
> > But again, business does not operate this way. Depending on the
> > nature of the business (making cars vs. producing fine wines, for
> > example), and depending on the business strategy (low cost leader
> > vs. quality niche market vs. something in between), as well as the
> > relative conditions of the market environment (stable vs. volatile)
> > -- all of these factors, along with others, combine to do exactly
> > what you propose should not be happening: businesses place relative
> > emphasis on quality vs. quantity vs. price, in congruence with their
> > particular mission and strategy. Some people seem to be making the
> > assumption that all businesses strive to produce the highest quality
> > product they can. It's a nice thought, but is generally false. The
> > level of quality, quantity, and price are all determined by one
> > thing: the strength of the market for the product. Business follows
> > the demand. If there's no demand for a high quality widget, there's
> > no incentive to produce one, much less base an entire business
> > strategy on it.
>
> OK, you're quite right.
>
> You certainly makes the issue clear, as someone just acknowledged.
> Thanks for putting it so well.
>
> I didn't think it through properly perhaps partly because I've got
> going on in my head at the moment a whole other discussion to do with
> whether business is a good model for other things -- hence the rather
> strange appearance of nature/nurture in the above.

Dear oh dear, I've got myself really confused here.

What Neil says, though true, doesn't really address what I was trying to
talk about, which was not a quality/*price* dichotomy at all.

The dichotomy I was talking about, or trying to talk about, was the
dichotomy between the intention to *make a profit* and the intention to
produce things of *good quality*, which is quite another thing.

Obviously 'good quality' is inseparable from its context -- indeed, a
'good' here has no meaning independent of *someone* wanting it. Then a
business operates, at choice, on the basis of the different demands for
the different 'goods' (even the language helps the idea out!) that there
are. And the business can choose to go up or downmarket.

But for a given product, and a given market, you're wise not to
dichotomise 'making a profit' and 'producing goods of quality', as we
were saying.

The issue with software then surfaces easily, because it soon won't be
(even now isn't, in my estimation) possible to produce goods of
sufficiently high quality (i.e. that *work* properly, even) to be
acceptable by the consumer, using closed tactics aimed at maximising
profit.

Why? Because of the present and increasing complexity of the systems
involved.

I wonder whether this statement is what Kevin Fay was calling 'religion'
or '(personal) philosophy' in his own thread?

I'd call it 'reading the writing on the wall' -- or, as a desperate
measure to stay on topic (this isn't the moderated list, thank God),
'playing the clarinet solo on the wall'.

:-)

Tony
--
_________ Tony Pay
|ony:-) 79 Southmoor Rd Tony@-----.uk
| |ay Oxford OX2 6RE GMN family artist: www.gmn.com
tel/fax 01865 553339

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