Tom Keating : VoIP & Gadgets Blog
Tom Keating
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Longview IoT Boosts Energy and Wireless Efficiency

Some of the biggest challenges slowing down the adoption of IoT are security, efficient battery usage and optimized wireless communications.One company has...

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Hallmark's Simple, Inexpensive Way to Boost Customer Satisfaction

In an effort to boost margins, companies often push more users to automated solutions such as FAQs, chatbots, voice bots and anything...

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Huawei Places the World's First 5G VoNR Video Call

Huawei recently completed the world's first voice over NR (VoNR) call. The voice and video call service was made using two Huawei...

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IGEL Advances Future of Work

IGEL is a provider of a next-gen edge OS for cloud workspaces. The company’s software products include IGEL OS, IGEL UD Pocket (UDP) and Universal...

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Tata Communications and Cisco Collaborate on SD-WAN

Tata Communications and Cisco have extended their partnership to enable enterprises to transform their legacy network to a customized and secure multi-cloud...

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How to Win the 50-Year-Old China Trade War

Today and this week in-fact is historic - the left and right in the U.S. agree that we have a major trade...

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Extreme Elements Enables The Autonomous Enterprise

Extreme Networks just announced Extreme Elements which in-turn enables the autonomous network and subsequently the autonomous enterprise. In a dynamic webinar, Dan...

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Sprint's Michael A. Rouleau Kicks off ITEXPO Keynotes

February 1, 2012

Digium Gamechanger! Launches D40, D50, & D70 IP Phones

February 1, 2012


Today, at ITEXPO, the premiere communications event, Digium launched a line of IP phones that work in conjunction with their Asterisk and Switchvox solutions. This truly could be a gamechanger, since Asterisk is a popular IP-PBX solution that popular 3rd party phone vendors such as Aastra, snom, and Polycom offer products for. This move by Digium and the impact on these phone vendors could be quite interesting. This reminds me of 2008 when Aastra, a traditional IP phone manufacturer decided to offer a full-fledged IP-PBX based on Asterisk, called AastraLink. As I said during the AastraLink 2008 product launch:
Aastra Telecom has entered the IP-PBX game with the AastraLink Pro 160.

Spam Soap - The MSP-Friendly Cloud-based Messaging Service Provider

January 31, 2012


At ITEXPO, I met with Eric Pinto, sales engineer from Spam Soap, a cloud-based messaging service provider. Founded in 2002, back in the early cloud days, Spam Soap pioneered the use of the MX record email filtering model. Today, Spam Soap has thousands of customers worldwide using a range of cloud-based messaging services, including, anti-virus filtering, anti-spam filtering, preserving business continuity, protecting confidential information, and ensuring regulatory compliance.

They currently have 900 channel partners and are very much channel-centric and leverage Managed Service Providers (MSPs). They'll point  direct end-users that come to them to a MSP.


Asterisk 1-2-3 so Packed They Moved to Bigger Room!

January 31, 2012

Zultys MX Release 7.0 Unified Communications Release Adds Android Support

January 31, 2012


At ITEXPO in Miami, Zultys today announced their latest UC software offering mobility features for Android, call center enhancements, and third-party CRM integrations. The latest major firmware release for the MX platform, MX Release 7.0 Unified Communications Software is a secure, all-in-one SIP-based IP phone system that is highly scalable and highly customizable. This version also includes enhancements to SIP security. 

Zultys introduced Zultys Mobile Communicator for iPhone and Blackberry users in MX Release 6.0.


Gadget Lovers! LaGuardia Airport Adds Electric Outlets to Waiting Gate Seats

January 30, 2012

No Winter for the Northeast - But Miami Here I Come!

January 29, 2012

It's almost February and it has been a very mild winter with only two snow storms so far and warmer temperatures than normal. Not that I'm complaining - my heating bill has been less than half it was from the previous winter even with the higher hearing oil prices. It sure didn't look like it was going to be a mild winter if you judged the coming winter back in October where a freak snow storm broke thousands of limbs in the Northeast, which had not yet shed their leaves. The leaves caught the wet snow weighing down the trees and causing massive damage to trees and power lines from fallen trees.

Symantec - Disable pcAnywhere Now! Who the Heck Still uses it?

January 27, 2012

Symantec suspected in 2006 that its network had been breached, but when Anonymous started talking publicly about Symantec source code it confirmed their suspicions. According to Wired:
The company surprised the public last week when it disclosed that hackers had obtained source code for its pcAnywhere software and other products, and that the code had likely been stolen in a six-year-old breach that Symantec had never disclosed.

Symantec said in its announcement that users should disable pcAnywhere until the company had time to update the software to ensure that hackers are unable to exploit holes they might find in the code.

Disable pcAnywhere?

Spirit Airlines Claims Government Forcing them to Hide Taxes in Fares

January 24, 2012


Check out this email I got from Spirit Airlines discussing how our U.S. government wants to HIDE government taxes from the American people. Most transparent Administration ever! NOT! Seriously? How can we as a republic support or oppose a particular political party or candidate if we cannot see the policies they've enacted?

Pumped for StartupCamp5's Fast-paced Startup Pitches

January 24, 2012

I'm headed out to ITEXPO East, taking place next week from January 31 through February 3, at the Miami Beach Convention Center, in Miami, Florida. One of the the items of my must-see list is StartupCamp5 Comm Edition, collocated with ITEXPO East. I'm pretty pumped to see this, especially since at StartupCamp4, Internet / Ethernet legend Bob Metcalfe gave a phenomenal keynote, which was very well received. You can see his keynote here:

During the keynote Bob had some kind words to say about Apple's Steve Jobs, before Steve Jobs passed. It was obvious from Bob's emotions that he knew his friend Steve had limited time left.

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