So my old friend Darryl Millington tells me that the YouTube Synon video I posted is generating quite a stir among the old Synon/Obsydian/2E/Plex faithful. The conversation is occuring on the CA chat boards.
A little history about that video. It was an internal fire up the troops piece created after the Microsoft Tech Ed event in Orlando in 1997. Synon was a major partner and sponsor with Microsoft as we were rolling out our Obsydian for backoffice generator. The show was huge with over 10,000 attendees.
Our booth used the now famous “cooking theme” which I dream’t up with Wasim Ahmad one late night in the Larkspur offices. Wasim was on a big time simplification kick of comparing technology to real life day to day easy to understand concepts. I recall we were talking about data models, patterns and multi-platform generators. Calling it a night, we decided to go for Thai Food at a place called Thep Lea in Strawberry Village, Mill Valley. When I had an epiphany … let’s contrast building applications with baking!
I compared models/patterns with recipes and the fact that if you have no recipe that you could probably get away with producing a cup cake or two, but to create a complex 3 tier wedding cake you need something a lot more sophisticated. Hence the cook/baking demo. Then I “borrowed” from the Got Milk campaign and created the concept of Got Obsydian.
Another cool thing was that we weaved in the “milk” as a concept of integrated model-based development with the Jug of milk representing the entire Obsydian model, whereas, 3 separate glasses of milk represented disconnected data model, UI code and Logic. The visual (for which I give Wasim credit for as he learned it on a course he went on) was that if you pour chocolate sauce into the jug it automatically mixes all the way through, whereas if you put chocolate milk just into a single glass, you have to “manually” mix into the other 2 glasses … ergo more work, more chance of mistakes and that is why Obsydian rocks.
The beauty of the entertainment and food was who can resist. Free cupcakes and milk for everyone … and the ever popular t-shirts. My idea for the t-shirts was to make Synon appear like the biggest company at the show. So as we handed out the shirts, the booth team were instructed to tell people to wear the shirts and that I (and my assistant Lynda Reynoso, who has since gotten herself on the IMDB database having appeared in a few films) would be wandering the halls with a video camera, and if seen in the shirt and selected they would get a pass to the exclusive party sponsored by Microsoft, Synon and Digital at the Hard Rock (which you see later on in the video). We handed out 2000 shirts and I swear, 1 in every 10 attendees was wearing one, sit was sea of Synon Obsydian 🙂
Additionally I wanted to show the momentum of Synon, so I had the people filmed asking them if they had initially ever heard of Synon or Obsydian. Of course they said “no”. So we spliced those clips at the beginning of the video. Then for effect, once they figured it out, we added the “phrase that pays’, “Who automatically generates designed for backoffice logo compliant applications” to which everyone said “Obsydian!”.
I heard later on that Ballmer himself commented that Synon outmarketed Microsoft at their own conference …. not a bad complement.
More about Synon and the Sterling acqusition later as well as Club Lava, the memorable developers Club that I started back in 1996.
If you would like to join the Synon Alumni Facebook Group let me know
In the meantime I’ve uploaded a few more Synon and Obsydian videos onto YouTube hope you enjoy them