Your siren's call for the silent majority of ISO 9000 supporters to speak out has gripped my fingers with a compulsion to write my first letter to a trade magazine. During my 30 plus years as a technician, engineer and manager in industry I have resisted this frivolity but no longer can. I am deeply disappointed by the attacks on ISO 9000 coming from within the quality community, the primary gist of which seems to be that the standard is nothing more than an exercise in excessive documentation. The assertions often also say that the standard does not adequately foster innovation and customer satisfaction. This is an argument that attempts to shift the responsibility of individuals and the organizations they control to a few words on paper -- like blaming one's speeding ticket on the title to the car.