FUD
In the computer software industry, (and by extension, those who are connected with it) FUD is an abbreviation for Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt.
Definition
FUD was first defined by Gene Amdahl after he left IBM to found his own company, Amdahl: "FUD is the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that IBM sales people instill in the minds of potential customers who might be considering Amdahl products." (quoted in [1])
Eric S. Raymond speaks more about this in [1]:
- "The idea, of course, was to persuade buyers to go with safe IBM gear rather than with competitors' equipment. This implicit coercion was traditionally accomplished by promising that Good Things would happen to people who stuck with IBM, but Dark Shadows loomed over the future of competitors' equipment or software. After 1991 the term has become generalized to refer to any kind of disinformation used as a competitive weapon."
Opponents of certain large computer corporations claim that the spreading of fear, uncertainty, and doubt is an unethical marketing technique that these corporations consciously employ.
By spreading questionable information about the drawbacks of less well-known products, an established company can discourage decision-makers from choosing those products over its wares, regardless of the relative technical merits. This is a recognised phenomenon, epitomised by the traditional axiom of purchasing agents that "nobody ever got fired for buying IBM" equipment. The result is that many companies' IT departments buy software which they know to be technically inferior because upper management is more likely to recognize the brand.
Recent developments
Although once it was usually attributed to IBM, in the 1990s and later the term became most often associated with industry giant Microsoft. The Halloween documents (leaked internal Microsoft documents whose authenticity was verified by the company) use the term FUD to describe a potential tactic, as in "OSS is long-term credible ... [therefore] FUD tactics can not be used to combat it." [2] More recently, Microsoft has issued statements about the "viral nature" of the GNU General Public License (GPL), which Open Source proponents purport to be FUD. Microsoft's statements are often directed at the GNU/Linux community in particular, to discourage widespread Linux adoption, which could hurt Microsoft's marketshare .
The SCO Group's 2003 lawsuit against IBM, claiming intellectual property infringements by the open source community, is also regarded by some as being an attempt at spreading FUD, especially about Linux. IBM directly alleged in its counterclaim to SCO's suit that SCO is spreading FUD [3].
It should be noted that FUD can be used incorrectly, when applied as a label to offhandedly dismiss criticism or legitimate debate. One example is if Microsoft issues a statement arguing the superiority of Windows over Linux, and a Linux supporter or group automatically denounces the statement as FUD regardless of its merit. Such an incorrect usage would be a general type of logical fallacy known as Ad hominem circumstantial.
Footnotes
- Raymond, Eric S. The Jargon File: FUD. [1] (http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/F/FUD.html)
- Open Source Initiative. Halloween I: Open Source Software (New?) Development Methodology [2] (http://www.opensource.org/halloween/halloween1.php#quote4)
- The SCO Group v IBM - answer to amended complaint and counterclaims (Undecided, US District Court - Utah, Kimball J, filed 6 August 2004) paragraph 23 [3] (http://www.groklaw.net/pdf/Doc-27.pdf)
External links and references
- FUD (http://www.cavcomp.demon.co.uk/halloween/fuddef.html) or the original page on the Internet Archive (http://web.archive.org/web/20020611090853/%68ttp://www.geocities.com/SiliconValley/Hills/9267/fuddef.html)
- This article or an earlier version of it came from the Jargon File.
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