Driving Technical Change

Pitfalls

There are a few practical considerations here. Obviously, if the tool or technique you’re trying to sell is an external one, you can’t use this. If you are pushing Subversion, you can’t enter that in any contests or release it as open source. So, only your own developed tools and techniques are eligible.

Your company may not like publicity for whatever reason and therefore will not allow you share company-developed systems with outsiders. Additionally, there is luck involved: just because you release as open source or put your app into consideration doesn’t mean you’ll actually get the publicity. However, when you do get it, publicity is really effective. So, it comes down to a gamble—is the time you put in worth the possible reward? ...