The Callicebus Monkey Club <Group behavior> of the Test&Measurement Industry

Engineering done by the T&M industry is not different from any other, and yet, the industry sees itself as very special, as the elite or Aristocracy of Electronics! The three leaders of this group are way-out in the <North/East corner> (highest cost) with their products. They are setting the <business model> for all their followers, just as the Kings court of old established the procedures (taxes) and fashions that were mirrored by all the smaller courts of counts, barons and earls of the domain. ------ The stability of such an aristocracy is guaranteed by either the peasant's (customer's) believe that it is the <natural> way of the world, or a force of power, (a monopoly). But how does such a system of organization deal with competition, which I believe is a universal drive of the human psyche? ---

The answer is: They operate essentially like noyaux! --- "The French ethnologist Jean-Jacques Petter coined the term noyau as a label for a <society of inward antagonism>. Robert Ardrey, writing some years later, identified it as a <neighborhood of territorial proprietors bound together by a dear-enemy relationship>. The Callicebus monkey is an example of the noyau in nature. Each Callicebus family spends its time, apart from eating and sleeping, in going to the borders of that which they have marked out for their own among the general treetops and engage in screaming and threatening with the adjoining family of Callicebus, who have also come to their boundary so that the display of antagonism can take place." *

This, except for the fact that physical territory is replaced by status and <market position> and screaming and threats are replaced by announcements of supposedly superior products, is the behavior pattern of the Firms of the T&M industry. Since all their products are basically of equal performance and equal high prices, announcements are just an intrigue generated by their Spin-doctors. E.g., the latest <treetop-threat> was the announcement of the "Infinium DSO" by Hewlett Packard, which is indistinguishable from a Windows 95 PC when turned-on. But there are two differences: it runs only one program - the DSO-program, and it costs 10 to 20 times as much as a PC. A propaganda-CD-ROM proclaims that even a severely technologically challenged customer [meaning most stupid peasant] can easily operate this DSO. ------ This was followed last month by an announcement of Tektronix for a completely new line of DSOs, the DPOs, Digital Phosphor Oscilloscopes. This is Tek's conventional DSO design, with a signal processor added to simulate the behavior of an "old-time" phosphor-screen analog scope. If you can imagine General Motors announcing a new line of cars resembling "old time" carriages, drawn by mechanical horses with internal V8 engines; then you know what this truly is - <monkey-business>! To counter this latest <treetop-threat>, the LeCroy Corp., the youngest executive monkey, bought two full-page ads, shouting only: "DPO? Been there, Done that!" ---- There is no "actual" intent to harm any of the fellow companies by "real" competition, because the <joined monopoly> maintains the <value-network-system> with extreme profit margins for all of them. In short, sales are enough and margins excellent, just, as there is no shortage of food for the Callicebus monkeys. (A paradise) ------

Is this an indefinitely self-perpetuating aristocracy? Maybe, --- but if it is, I believe it runs counter to the instinctive process of human evolution in business and the evolution of technology, it is decadent! It also makes it impossible to interest any of the Test&Measurement companies (about 15 Firms) in a new design for their <Flagship product>, the DSO, at 1/20 the cost, 1/10 the size and several times the bandwidth, compared to their best present offerings. Such a product would be considered a sacrilege, because it introduces real competition, which violates the fundamental canons and doctrines of <the Callicebus monkey club>. Back to Index

* I did not check the references; the story comes from the novelist Gordon R Dickson. Go Funny page