Skype Journal comments on ITEXPO

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Skype Journal comments on ITEXPO

Phil Wolff over at Skype Journal was at ITEXPO and he has some interesting comments. For one he comments on there not being a lot of Skype-related products at the show when he states:
It was bizarre for me, all VoIP but almost no Skype in the hall, and none in the official program. This conference brings VoIP resellers and enterprise buyers (seen above in masthead photo) to the exhibitors, corporate VoIP toolmakers. Skype, as far as these folks are concerned, is in another industry, consumer VoIP, and not their business. Mostly, the exhibitors and speakers don't even mention Skype because their clients haven't bought or sold millions of dollars of Skype products.

He has some very valid points. TMC certainly brings VoIP resellers and enterprise buyers to the ITEXPO show, but he's right in that Skype had a limited presence at the show, which is a little surprising considering Niklas Zennstrom has keynoted ITEXPO in the past. Actiontec was demoing their cool VoSKY Skype gateway product, but they were one of the few and far between Skype-related companies at the show.

Phil is also correct about ITEXPO drawing VoIP resellers and enterprise buyers. I've been told by several vendors that our show draws more VoIP resellers and especially enterprise buyers than any other VoIP/telecom show. This isn't me tooting TMC's horn, it's just what I've been told many times. I have been told that another major VoIP show has traditionally been better at creating partnerships and has drawn more service providers. With our last two ITEXPOs, I would now disagree with the service provider comment, but regardless, it appears that in some ways the two major VoIP shows in some ways don't even compete with each other.

In any event, Phil photographed what he called the "mad rush" about to enter the exhibit hall. In fact, he took this photo and changed Skype Journal's masthead image at the top to depict the massing crowd about to enter the exhibit hall. He then applied a "blurr" effect to the ITEXPO image. How appropriate, considering ITEXPO was a blurr to me, since I was so busy.

Here's a snippet of Phil's image. Since my blog's max width is limited to 450 pixels, I had to trim the "Skype" word out of Skype Journal:
Skype Journal

Rich Tehrani also captured the "mad rush" on his Verizon XV6700 mobile phone, which he instantly published to his blog using a Perl script coded by yours truly. ;)

Here's a borrowed image showing the "mad rush" taken from Rich's entry. I should mention that his entry also includes a bunch of other photos, including the reception party that are worth a look.
ITEXPO Exhibit Hall line to get in

As I said, last week's ITEXPO was a blur and I've been meaning to blog my take on the show. I had so many vendors to meet, plus I moderated a few sessions, and I was remotely checking email and remotely troubleshooting some of our servers. After the ITEXPO blur effect, I'm still trying to catch-up on some things. I'm also in the process of migrating our main blog server from Windows to Linux - a major project, but a story/blog entry for another day.

In addtion, today Benzy Fernando, who is part of my MIS team is leaving TMC after 8 years of working together. I'm tasked with finding, interviewing, and hiring a good replacement for this MIS/IT position. My job just got busier -- if that's even possible -- but I wish Benzy the utmost success in his new position. He will be sorely missed by the entire TMC team.

p.s. I saw Phil Wolff in the press room and I meant to introduce myself, but I was busy. So Phil, if you read this, let's meet at the next ITEXPO.


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