Steve Holden wrote:
Bulba! wrote:
Indeed not. Quite often the brown paper bag is a factor in purchases like this. I wouldn't be at all surprised if somebody with a major input to the decision-making process retired to a nice place in the country shortly afterwards. You appear to be making the mistake of believing that people will act in the larger interest, when sadly most individuals tend to put their own interests first (some would go as far as to define self-interest as the determinant of behavior).I was utterly shocked. Having grown up in Soviet times I have been used to seeing precious resources wasted by organizations as if resources were growing on trees, but smth like this?! In a shining ideal country of Germany?! Unthinkable.
Indeed, it is almost expected that those in charge of any large organization (whether government, corporation, trade union, industry association, fan club, or whatever else) are likely to act in their personal interests at the expense of the organization's interests. This is why things like public-disclosure laws and oversight committees exist. As they say, power corrupts. (Of course, this is not at all limited to people in charge; it's just most notable there, since those people can direct the efforts of the rest of the organization for their personal gain, whereas a rank-and-file member can typically only direct their own efforts.)
It's also noteworthy to consider that many times, waste happens not because of corruption or self-interest, but simply because of errors of judgement. Humans being as we are, it's inevitable that over time, some "obvious" important details will escape our attention, and the resulting imperfect information will result in poor decisions. This is a simple fact of human nature, and (ob-Python ;) ) it's one of the reasons that Python is designed as it is -- it makes a serious effort to reduce the number of details that might escape detection.
(One should also consider that many business failures are a case of simply having played the odds and lost. Many ventures depend on outside events playing in a certain way; when by chance those events happen, the decision-makers are called "bold and insightful", but if things don't work out, they're called foolish or misguided. Often, though, it was not foolishness but shrewd risk-taking -- if you take a one-in-three chance of making a tenfold return on investment, then 66% of the time you'll lose.... but if you hit those odds just once, you'll come out way ahead.)
Jeff Shannon Technician/Programmer Credit International
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