And some of the most successful internet-savvy companies, such as Google and Microsoft, are as secretive about what they do as any old-line company.

ECONOMIST: Schumpeter

But we can look at the marketing practices their firms used to rocket from irrelevance to dominance, and we can examine how an old-line company outside of tech has adapted those approaches successfully.

FORBES: 6 Lessons from the New Tech Titans

There was a time when IBM was synonymous with the image as a stodgy and rigid old-line technology company.

FORBES: Connect

Kodak's current woes boil down to that eerily familiar song: An old-line technology company unable to adapt to the fast-pace and vicious competition of the digital age.

FORBES: Kodak's digital crisis

With an old-line tech company wrinkle, though: Leverage the government.

FORBES: Cisco's Riches-Educate India?

While emitting IR or controlling an RS-232 device over the LAN is an old trick for this company, the latest line really takes it to the next level.

ENGADGET: New WiFi IR emitters from Global Cache? get us excited about home automation

But today the company is predominantly a hodgepodge of old-line media properties.

FORBES: Magazine Article

Worse, customers have to stay on line for long time to talk with someone with the old company to disconnect their services: and even longer time waiting for the cable man to show up and switch their services.

FORBES: Why Companies Treat New Customers Better than Old Customers?

At the end of the day, once your company crosses the line into the public markets, you must play by the same old rules.

FORBES: Tech Execs Successors To The Robber Barons, Says Newsweek