It was my observation that this was largely true in the '90s.  Has anything changed?  DB2 get MVCC?  SQL Server did for the 2005 version.<p>Are people buying Oracle RAC or IBM's equivalent offering?  How much do IBM's higher end offerings require running them on their mainframes, which continue to be more and more alien to the IT workforce?<p>I'm not following this closely, but I don't get the impression that IBM is catching up.