Carl Tyler's Blog

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Grant Bingham cleverly writes the Sametime history as that of a child growing up. Watching the child growing up I saw it a little differently, so in a similar style, here is how I remember Sametime growing up..

Databeam and Ubique had already had a couple of foster parents and IBM came along. IBM had tried to conceive for a long time, but had no luck, so they went to an adoption agency and them both as the kids looked like the sort they'd like to have.

IBM made the two of them share a room and told them to get along with their older sibling Notes.

Turns out Databeam and Ubique were two twins separated at birth and got along great with each, they became inseparable and were never seen apart, they started to go by the nickname Sametime. The two of them even started hanging out with Notes and got along with all the friends that Notes had.

This is when a miracle happened, IBM conceived their own child, Workplace, IBM believed that their own child held the same promise and abilities as all the other children combined, and with it being their own conception, they started to pay more attention to their new child than the others. IBM just didn't feel as close to Sametime as it did to the new child, they even tried giving Sametime a new nickname Workplace Instant Messaging and Conferencing to make it feel more of the family, but Sametime never took to it and always liked to refer to themselves as Sametime.

Sametime, was starting to get neglected, It's parent no longer took them out, they hadn't been given any new clothes in years, and they could really do with some dental work. IBM didn't even arrange for a baby-sitter when they went out. Sametime really was feeling let down. Fortunately, Sametime had some great friends and uncles and aunts that worked hard to keep people aware of the twins and the promise they'd displayed from the beginning. Sametime's God parents helped teach Sametime some new tricks and helped nourish the child whilst IBM was neglecting them. Some aunts and uncles even tried to tell IBM they were not taking good care of their child, but they'd respond with comments like "I know how to look after my kids, concentrate on your own family".

As Workplace matured, IBM realized that the promise it thought it had displayed at an early age had been misplaced parental pride, it turned out Workplace hadn't been as smart as they had believed and in fact Workplace needed to stay after school for additional lessons to try and catch up with the other kids. Workplace could still do some things, but it often needed the help of the teacher to get a simple understanding of the basics and to get going on their own.

Friends of Sametime really start to make some noise, and went to social services to let them know that they believed Sametime was being neglected by their parent. Social Services agreed and threatened to remove Sametime from their parent unless the child was treated to some new clothes and given the respect that was given to the other children in the family. IBM took this as a bit of a shock, but upon closer inspection agreed. Sametime will be graduating shortly with their new clothes, all there friends that stuck by them in the tough years will be there to congratulate them.