Pain, suffering and...some tough love The comments on ALA about the article "Educate your stakeholders" indicate that however hard we try to equip clients with the knowledge they need to make good decisions - often just don't care. Why? Well, some clients are just not ready to listen. They need to learn from their mistakes before they will give us their attention. However, if we can give them a glimpse of the horrible future that waits them (if they ignore us), perhaps this will encourage their attention? One way to do this is to put a price on their ignorance. That is, tell them: "You can ignore me if you like. But if you do, you may miss something important. That creates the risk that you will do something stupid, e.g. use inappropriate technology, forget about the law. Such risks can usually be translated into a financial loss of some kind, e.g. legal penalties, lost revenue. So, now I am going to give you a glimpse of such a future, in which you fail to consider the necessary web decision factors. It may scare you! While I admit that the risks/costs associated with some factors are worse than others - if you aren't familiar with them, how will you know which to concentrate on? Now, do you still want to ignore me?"