Bluecoat Dupes ISAserver.org to Promote False Advertising and Fraudulant Claims
- From: "Thomas W Shinder" <tshinder@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: "[ISAserver.org Discussion List]" <isalist@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 3 Feb 2006 22:41:22 -0600
If you subscribe to the ISAserver.org newsletter, you might have noticed
that Bluecoat bought some advertising space in the newsletter. I don't
have content control over the advertising, and I wasn't even aware of
the ad placement until a couple of hours before it was published.
However, even if I were aware, I wouldn't want to censor a sponsor who
is willing to pay to share his message with potential customers. In
fact, I was sort of impressed by how creative and aggressive they were
in their attempt to obtain competitive information in their war against
the ISA firewall. Competition is good and ends up benefiting the
customer.
What does NOT benefit the customer are false, misleading and fraudulent
claims and information. Check out this video advertised in the
ISAserver.org newsletter:
http://www.bluecoat.com/downloads/isawebcast.wmv
The introduction is benign enough and provides basic marketing
information about Web proxy servers, covering the security and access
control advantages proxy devices can provide. However, when they get
into a discussion of the so-called weaknesses of the ISA firewall, they
are blatently, incontrovertably, and irreconcilably wrong. The false
claims would be laughable if it didn't generate even more anger than
humor. Anger from Bluecoats explicit lies and false information
regarding the ISA firewall's weaknesses vis a vis the Bluecoat proxy.
For knowledgable ISA firewall admins, you'll be as shocked as I am. If
you're a fledgling or part time ISA firewall admin, the prevarications
won't be as clear. I promise to provide you the facts, with full
technical detail that counters each of their false assertions, either in
the next newsletter, in a full fledged article, or a detailed blog post.
I would hate for anyone who downloaded the Bluecoat video in good faith,
and listened to it in good faith, to be taken advantage of because one
of our advertisers tried to parlay a potential customer's ignorance
about the ISA firewall platform into a potential sale.
Please take this as my formal apology to all ISAserver.org members and
ISA firewall fans for providing Bluecoat a venue for peddling their
false and deceptive advertising. We work very hard to run a clean,
ethical and professional shop, and in my opinion, Bluecoat hurt our
credibility. Its a true lose/lose situation, as Bluecoat doesn't need
misrepresent ISA firewall product in order to demonstrate its own
strengths and thus sullied their own reputation as a credible vendor.
They have a quality product that can stand on its own without making
false claims regarding weaknesses in the ISA firewall product.
Tom
Thomas W Shinder, M.D.
Site: www.isaserver.org <http://www.isaserver.org/>
Blog: http://spaces.msn.com/members/drisa/
Book: http://tinyurl.com/3xqb7 <http://tinyurl.com/3xqb7>
MVP -- ISA Firewalls
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