10,000 Monkeys - Harnessing the Power of Typing Monkeys

Adobe Evangelists vs. Microsoft Evangelists

How do you effectively measure the effectiveness of an evangelist?  Blog readership?  Event appearances?  Customer satisfaction? Surveys?  Product sales per region?  I don't know if any of those are a true measure of evangelizing power. 

For me it comes down who is most effective at getting their message out to uncharted territories.

Let's look at Adobe.

Obviously as I posted before there is Ryan Stewart, the RIA Mountaineer. 

We know that there is some small monastery full of Buddhist monks in the foothills of Nepal that hasn't yet been enlightened on the benefits of rich internet applications such as the intuitive, effective user interfaces.  Ryan is going to find them and evangelize.  I don't know how they get internet access out there, but perhaps he has some sort of Adobe satellite connection in that backpack.

Then there is James Ward, the RIA Cowboy

He's a cowboy or "El Vaquero de RIA" as they call him at the New Mexico Flex User Group.  If RIA developers need wranglin', he's the man roping them in with connected, responsive applications.  Oddly enough, the National Senior Pro Rodeo Association is sponsored by SilverLite.  Clearly the RIA frontier is a wild, unpredictable place.

How can Microsoft compete with Adobe's pantheon of RIA adventurers? 

Adam Kinney, Technical Evangelist covering Silverlight and WPF.

Sure, he's covering Silverlight, but how do you compete with a cowboy?  A pirate?  Silverlight Pirate probably sends the wrong message.  Although, the high seas seem largely unclaimed by Adobe evangelists. 

I propose that he becomes Adam Kinney, Silverlight Surfer. 

Of course the Silver(light) Surfer can also evangelize in outer space which should give Microsoft initial RIA supremacy of the cosmos until Adobe counters with Lee Brimelow, RIA Astronaut.

Next is Jesse Liberty, Silverlight Geek.

It's close.  But not adventurous enough. 

I submit, Jesse Liberty, Captain Silverlight.  Battling the evil forces of non-rich interactive applications wherever they may be.

(Tough to see, but the podium actually says "Liberty" on it which I thought would make the re-branding process easier)

Finally, there is Tim Sneath, Client Platform Evangelist.

Tim doesn't have a picture on his blog.  Or a bio.  Clearly a man who prefers stealth.  Therefore I now dub him, Tim Sneath, Silverlight Ninja Warrior.  Probably unbeatable by Adobe.  The only way they can counter is with a RIA Pirate, which as we have discussed previously is probably a bad idea.

I'm also planning on re-branding myself as the Indiana Jones of software development in the upcoming weeks.  Just need to take some photos of myself in the jungle or some ancient ruins with my laptop.