Flowers are really cheap. Do you know what’s really expensive? Divorce.

If you’re going to eat shit. Don’t nibble

I appreciate the difficulties and more than that, I thank you deeply for the effort. However, I do not think that I’ve made myself clear on the situation that we’re in. This is not a scenario where an excuse will do. This is a must win. If EDS drops us, we’re fucked and it’s over. The IPO, avoiding the bankruptcy, all the layoffs and pain will have been for nothing – because we’d be dead. So, our only option is to win. We cannot lose this one.

It has come to my attention that many people are uncomfortable with the amount of profanity that we use. Being the number-one abuser, these complaints have caused me to reflect on my own behavior as well as the company as a whole. As I see it, we have two choices: (a) we can ban profanity or (b) we can accept profanity. Anything in between is very unlikely to work. ‘Minimal profanity’ cannot be enforced. I’ve said before that we cannot win unless we attract the very best people in the world. In the technology industry, almost everybody comes from a culture that allows profanity. Therefore, banning profanity will likely limit our talent pool more than accepting profanity. As a result, we will allow profanity. However, this does not mean that you can use profanity to intimidate, sexually harass people, or do other bad things. In this way, profanity is no different from other language. For example, consider the word ‘cupcakes.’ It’s fine for me to say to Shannon, ‘Those cupcakes you baked look delicious.’ But it is not okay for me to say to Anthony, ‘Hey, Cupcakes, you look mighty fine in them jeans.