Top 100 Tech Podcasters as per GetVoIP - me and 99 Others!

GetVoIP.com follows our space pretty well, and while their main business is being a channel/resource for buyers of VoIP, they provide some good content. Some of it they generate themselves, and some comes via industry watchers, myself included.

Everybody likes a top 10 list, and GetVoIP produces these from time to time, with the latest one coming yesterday. This was the top 100 "tech podcasters to follow on Twitter", and I'm happy to say they've included me, along with colleagues such as Blair Pleasant, Dave Michels and Don Van Doren. There are many other familiar names as well, along with others I don't know, so if you're looking to broaden your horizon of thought leaders in this space, you should check out their list.

CTCA Spring Conference - Will be Speaking There

Things seem to go in waves for me, and after staying put for a while, I have a conference later this month, three in April and two so far in May. I'll be quite busy with ETS later this month, and first up in April is the CTCA's annual conference.

We've had some near misses the past few years, but this time around the calendars have lined up, and I'll be participating at their 2014 event, April 8-10, in Gravenhurst, Ontario. It's relatively local for me, and being held at a nice resort, it should be a great destination for attendees travelling from across Canada.

CTCA is the core community of telecom consultants here, so there's no better place to read the state of how communications technologies are being deployed in Canada. I'll be doing my part by giving a keynote to kick off the conference, and moderating a panel on the cloud later that day. For my keynote, I'll be talking about five themes and trends that are shaping the telecom landscape, and that should set the table nicely for the rest of the conference.

The cloud panel should be fun, as we have a mix of operators and vendors - Rogers and Cogeco, along with Interactive Intelligence and NEC. My keynote is at 9:15, and the panel rounds out the content for Day 1 at 4:15. Here's the link for the full agenda, along with more detail about each session.

I'll have more updates as the date gets closer, and hope to see some of you there!

ETS - Energy Thought Summit - March 24-25, Austin - Coming?

As ETS gets closer, I need to wear my Smart Grid hat a bit more often and do my part to support and promote the event. My partners at Zpryme Research have done a great job putting the program together and drawing together a first rate lineup of thought leaders. If your goal is to learn from the best and brightest, this event is for you. It's not a trade show and we have a limit on how many attendees can participate.

In terms of star power, from the tech world, SteveWozniak needs no introduction. I'm involved in Smart Grid because of the rich intersection between communications technology and the evolving energy sector. Bridging Steve's perspective to the world of Smart Grid, we have thought leaders from across the full spectrum, including George Arnold, Andres Carvallo, Massoud Amin, Rajit Gadh, Mei Shibata, Emir Macari, Becky Harrison, Ken Laberteaux, and many others.

The speaker lineup alone is reason to come, but so will be the learning from the sessions and of course, the invaluable networking that comes from being in this intimate setting for two days. I'll be there in plain view, likely moderating a couple of panels, and will serve as the event MC on Day 2.

I'll do my best to keep this on your radar, and for full event and registration info, here's the ETS website.

Role of Multichannel in the Contact Center - UCS Podcast

Posting has been a bit behind on the UCStrategies portal, but the most recent podcast has now been added. The topic was the role of multichannel in the contact center - what technologies are being used, how well it's working, how well trained are the agents, etc.

It's a rich topic about a complex challenge, and we had lots to say about it. I only commented briefly, but there are many perspectives worth hearing, and the moderator, Don Van Doren, managed to make room for everybody. Here's the link, which includes a transcript if you'd rather just read what was said.

February Writing Roundup - My Top 8 Picks

Thought I'd start doing a monthly roundup post for my followers who don't religiously read every single post or article of mine. As you may know, I write in a variety of places, and I don't expect anybody follows them all - although you really should! - and even if you wanted to, you may not know where to find them.

On that note, if you don't know, a handy reference would be this page from my website. You might want to bookmark that.

Aside from Ziff Davis, the links there take you to my profile page where you can see an archive of my current posts - UCStrategies, ADTRAN, InformationWeek and Internet Telephony Magazine. For now, Ziff Davis is a challenge, but I will be getting a profile page there soon. Until then, the only way to see my writing there is to follow my tweets (@arnoldjon). I post there 2-3 times a week, and I tweet whenever there's a new article.

With that out of the way, this roundup post is for people who like my writing. I plan to do a monthly digest, so in one place you can click and read what I consider are my most notable posts for that time period. My intention is for you to get a fuller sense of the topics I write about - aside from my regular posts here on this blog - as well as the various outlets I share content with.

So, here are 8 posts from last month that showcase my latest thinking on the IP communications space:

All You Need is Lync - InformationWeek (if you like that, read this too)

How Bob Newhart Would Respond to UC - UCStrategies

Amazon Mayday - What it Mean for Your Contact Center - Internet Telephony Magazine, Jan/Feb issue

External Risk - Another Layer to Consider with UC - ADTRAN Blog

Is VoIP Putting Your Network at Risk? - guest post on No Jitter (more here on VoIP security)

Evolution of VoIP and Early Beginnings - Toolbox.com (Ziff Davis)

No Office? No Problem! Decentralize Your Phone System with Hosted VoIP - Toolbox.com

What you Need to Know About POTS vs PBX - Toolbox.com

Evolution of VoIP Webinar, Tomorrow at 2 - Join Us!

Just a quick shout-out for my next webinar with Ziff Davis B2B. It's tomorrow at 2 ET, and the title pretty much says it all. If you want an overview of how we got here with VoIP, along with why it's a great time to be using it, you'll want to be there.

You can get there from here, and I hope to see you on the call!

All You Need Is Lync - Altogether Now...

Lync is all you need, Lync is all you need.

You can't get that out of your head now, can ya? Music is my thing, and I just thought that title worked really well for what Microsoft was messaging at last week's Lync conference, or love-in, if I was keeping in character with Sgt. Pepper-era Beatles.

On that note, I'm not the only one who likes to link (or Lync - ugh) past and present with the Fab Four. Did you see this 2 minute rave-up on Jimmy Fallon the other night? - a little too cool for comfort, but spot-on...

Back to the topic at hand - Lync. For this month's column on InformationWeek, I wrote about how a lot of good things are coming together for Lync, but interestingly, they seem to be more focused on video than voice, which of course speaks loudly for how they see the world moving without the need for phone systems.

I'm equally concerned that whether they focus on voice or video, MSFT and their telecom partners/rivals might miss a bigger boat, namely Facebook. Having bought WhatsApp, they now have a huge user base on par with Skype, and by adding voice the other day, things sure could get interesting if people start relying more on text for their primary mode of communicating.

Enough. It's time to head over to the IW site, and you can read my article here. If this gets you going, please join the conversation, and I'll be sure add more thoughts in the commentary.