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Thoughts on some of the roles that I could fill… (and slowly eroding my resistance to going the consulting route)
Continue Reading: Thoughts on some of the roles that I could fill… (and slowly eroding my resistance to going the consulting route)One of the most common reactions to my note last week about my impending employment change (outside of the truly amazing things people have said) has been some variation on the question – "so what is it you want to do?" or "what kind of roles are you looking for?"
Fair questions. And a bit challenging given that I have a diverse range of interests and abilities. But since I’m trying out this experiment in being very public about my employment search, I’ll list some examples of the type of roles I’m ideally seeking – along with the caveat that all of them are interesting and so a role that involved several of them might be even more interesting. So here are some thoughts:
- Emerging Technology Analyst – A good amount of the work I did for Mitel was what I talked about in my note last week. Standing up in the "crow’s nest", staring out at the horizons to identify opportunities and threats – and then translating that into internal communication within the company about what it might mean to the business. What’s the opportunity with social networks? Facebook? What’s the opportunity or threat with Skype? Asterisk? competitors? partners? …
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Skype Journal: "The Dawn of the Mashup World"
Continue Reading: Skype Journal: "The Dawn of the Mashup World"For a couple of months now, a post has been swirling around in my brain that I was tentatively titling “The Dawn of the Mashup Culture” in which I wanted to talk about “mashups” and why they are so incredibly important. Unfortunately I just haven’t had the time to put all those thoughts into the written word.
Well, in the meantime, Jim Courtney went off and wrote something very close to what I was intending to do: “The Dawn of the Mashup World – Part 1: Challenges, Why and Expectations” followed by “Part 1a: What is a Mashup?“
Read them. (And the follow-on posts that Jim indicates he’s writing.)
Mashups are fundamentally changing the way we can use and control services. It’s the remix culture.
You need to understand it… because if you don’t, your products and services will be left behind.
Open APIs win. Mashups win.
Technorati tags: mashups, apis, skype, skype journal, jim courtney -
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O’Reilly’s Emerging Telephony (ETel) 2008 Conference – I’m on the Program Committee and we’re looking for submissions (due by September 17th)
Continue Reading: O’Reilly’s Emerging Telephony (ETel) 2008 Conference – I’m on the Program Committee and we’re looking for submissions (due by September 17th)Prior to getting distracted last week by employment issues I was intending to post here about the upcoming ETel 2008 conference on March 3-4, 2008, down in San Diego, CA. For two years in a row, ETel has been my favorite conference to attend, primarily because it’s all about the wacky stuff people are doing on the edge of telephony. Unlike VoiceCon, VON and ITEXPO, it’s not a trade show. There’s no real exhibit hall (or hasn’t been)… it’s all about the content. And there have been been some great sessions showcasing projects and products people are doing that really push the edge of what we are calling “telephony” today.
Two reasons to post about it. First, I’m on the ETel 2008 Program Committee along with a number of others who may be familiar to people in this space. (Note to self: I’ll need to update that bio in two weeks.)
Second, and the main reason I wanted to post – the ETel 2008 Call for Participation is open and we’re looking for submissions!
PROPOSALS ARE DUE SEPTEMBER 17th
As the page says… are you a:
- Technologist, strategist, CTO, CIO changing the world with your ideas?
- Technology evangelist, scout, entrepreneur…
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Great overview of SIP security now posted on Blue Box site…
Continue Reading: Great overview of SIP security now posted on Blue Box site…Over on Blue Box, I uploaded on Friday what I consider one of the best overviews about SIP security that we’ve done: Blue Box Special Edition #20. I recorded the interview out at VoiceCon San Francisco in August and it’s with Cullen Jennings who is a Distinguished Engineer at Cisco Systems, but more relevant to SIP is one of the Area Directors for the Real-time Applications and Infrastructure (RAI) area within the IETF. Basically all of the proposals for RFCs relating to SIP roll up under the RAI area. Cullen’s also quite interested in and knowledgeable about security and in fact several of the security-related RFCs related to SIP include Cullen as one of the authors (as do a number of the current proposed Internet-Drafts).
So he knows his stuff… and being a frequent presenter, he’s also good at distilling complex things down into more simple descriptions, so it was an enjoyable interview that I think you will also find quite educational. If you’re working with SIP, or considering it, I’d highly recommend you listen to the show.
Technorati tags: SIP, SIP security, VoIP, VoIP security, security, cullen jennings, dan york -
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Suggestions for a VERY small, portable, *wired* headset/mic for travel?
Continue Reading: Suggestions for a VERY small, portable, *wired* headset/mic for travel?As I packed for my travel to IT Expo early tomorrow morning, I was again annoyed that I still haven’t found a great headset (with microphone) for travelling. A little bit ago, I bought the Logitech “Premium Notebook Headset” which is in fact a very nice headset. Audio sounds great, fits well, works great with all the various VoIP softphones I use… I have no real complaints about how it functions. I bought it in part because it folds flat and has a nice hardshell case. But it has a problem – it’s still too darn big!
I never check bags when on business travel. I have my “roller” travel luggage and then my laptop bag on top of that. Space is at an absolute premium. And given that I cram a lot of equipment into my laptop bag, having a small but hard plastic case is really critical. (As previous (destroyed!) headsets without cases will attest!) An example that works is my wonderful Sennheiser PCX 100 headphones that fold up into this nice little hard case that is about 5.5 inches long, 3 inches wide and 1 inch deep. Fantastic! (Curiously, though, Sennheiser doesn’t seem to make them…
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Thanks… (and I expect my ‘light blogging’ won’t be so light)
Continue Reading: Thanks… (and I expect my ‘light blogging’ won’t be so light)MANY thanks for all the kinds words sent my way after yesterday’s post, both publicly and privately. I’ll admit that aspect of it has been a bit overwhelming! But it’s VERY definitely appreciated. Thank you.
As to this comment I made:
In the meantime, I may be blogging a little less here for a bit as I focus on what comes next.
The reality is that after seven years of doing it, blogging has become ingrained and is just part and parcel of what I do on a daily basis… already this morning I’ve started several posts. I expect that I’ll realistically just keep on posting because that’s part of what I do. Stay tuned…
And again… thanks!
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Mitel/Inter-Tel integration plan restructures me out of a job…
Continue Reading: Mitel/Inter-Tel integration plan restructures me out of a job…UPDATE – October 23, 2007 – As of yesterday, I started employment with Voxeo. MANY thanks to all of you who offered kind words, job leads, references and help in many other ways. Thank you!
UPDATE – Sept 13, 2007 – Because I have been repeatedly asked about the type of roles I am seeking, I posted some thoughts on the kind of positions I would ideally like to pursue.
UPDATE – Sept 9, 2007 – My resume is now available for those wanting more information on my background.
"Every new beginning starts with some other beginning’s end."
I found myself humming that chorus from the song "Closing Time" by the band Semisonic late on Tuesday after a very frank and cordial call with my manager (Mitel’s CTO), who has always been great to work with and with whom I’ve had a wonderfully open relationship. Some of you may have seen the news – there was a "reduction in headcount" at Mitel on Tuesday as part of the "integration plan" resulting from the merger with Inter-Tel. This is pretty much inevitable in any merger as there is always some duplication and some need to reduce the overall number of…
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Iotum improves their Facebook conference call app…
Continue Reading: Iotum improves their Facebook conference call app…What a difference a day makes. When I wrote about Iotum’s “Free Conference Call” app for Facebook yesterday, I mentioned that there were a few things still in development. Today, as shown in the image on the right (click on it for larger image), they’ve already addressed two of the issues: 1) the Agenda can now be completed (and in fact is the second step now while you are setting up the call); and 2) they’ve corrected the display issues with the participants. With a few participants, the pictures loaded in very quickly, and with a larger number of participants the pictures were removed and only the names were shown. Kudos to the Iotum team for iterating so quickly.
FYI, as shown in the image, I did participate in the “historic” public conference call hosted today by Moshe Maeir at 3:30 Eastern US time today. It was a good demonstration as at one point we had easily 10+ people involved. Very nice to see who joined simply by looking at the list of participants and seeing who was in green. (Hmmm… note to Alec, you might want to rethink the use of green and red as there is some percentage of…
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Facebook gets free conference calls with Facebook app from Iotum
Continue Reading: Facebook gets free conference calls with Facebook app from IotumConference calls – inside of Facebook? And for free?
Yes… courtesy of the folks up at Ottawa-based startup Iotum. As I’ve written before, there are tons of applications being developed for Facebook, but there haven’t been a whole lot of voice applications and there have been even fewer (in fact, almost none) voice-over-IP (VoIP) applications. Of the existing voice apps (nicely listed by Pat Phelan), most of them are really what I’ll call “consumer” apps… primarily focused on cheaper phone calls or making it easier to call people. Or “calling” other Facebook users – or leaving them voicemail. But there haven’t really yet been any interesting apps I’ve seen that could provide business features.
Until now. The team at Iotum just released their “Free Conference Call” Facebook application and now allowed anyone to install it. Until now, it’s been in a very limited test phase, but after Alec issued his request for volunteers last Friday, I naturally had to give it a try (and he asked us not to write about it until today).
So here’s the process. After you’ve installed the app, you have to go through a brief authentication process to put your mobile phone number on file with…
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FYI – I’m speaking at Ingate SIP Trunking Seminar Series Sept 11 in LA (concurrent with Internet Telephony Expo)
Continue Reading: FYI – I’m speaking at Ingate SIP Trunking Seminar Series Sept 11 in LA (concurrent with Internet Telephony Expo)FYI, for those of you attending the Internet Telephony Conference & Expo in Los Angeles on September 10-12, I’ll be participating in a panel session that is part of Ingate’s SIP Trunking Seminar Series. I expect it will surprise no one to learn that I’ll be on the panel about “Enterprise Security and VoIP” wearing my VOIP Security Alliance hat. My particular session is Tuesday, September 11, 2007, from 9:30-11:00 am. (And yes, I guess it is appropriate in a way to be talking about security on 9/11!) More details and the schedule are available online.
The sessions are free and open to anyone to attend. Simply fill out the pre-registration form.
Technorati tags: sip, sip security, sip trunking, ingate, ingate systems, voipsa, voip, voip security, dan york
Disruptive Telephony
Dan York on how Voice over IP is rewriting (almost) everything you thought you understood about telephony…
