Network operators can no longer remain status quo - they must innovate to keep pace with user expectations for services and quality.  So what are the key areas for them to consider?

Fortunately Alcatel-Lucent has put together a highly useful study on this topic. As it says, "network service providers dealing with massive bandwidth demand are struggling to evolve their networks while keeping costs under control."

The paper finds that arriving at "cost-effective, customer-oriented" answers demands a change of perspective - "away from traditional operational preoccupations toward a view guided by financial and strategic business considerations."

The study then does a good job unpacking that insight, noting that, among other strategies, "expenditures must be reduced and revenue per transported bit increased."

To help tackle such approaches, Alcatel-Lucent, which officials say has drawn on its experience in network design, deployment, operation and migration, has developed "a cost-transformation model to help service providers understand the new economics of their businesses and derive the greatest value from their networks."

Ethernet has been the LAN technology of choice for decades, "and the role of Ethernet in data center networks has been growing."

Industry expert Tom Nolle notes also that "pressure to conserve costs, consolidate data center resources, and support new software models like SOA have all combined to create a radically new set of demands on data center Ethernet."

Nolle sees both accomplishment and new challenges facing the industry ahead. There is little doubt, he says, that Ethernet will ultimately meet these demands in data center networks, "but there's also little doubt that both the evolution of Ethernet technology and the evolution from the older Ethernet LAN models to new models will challenge data center network plans for three years - or throughout the current refresh cycle."

The need for IT and telecom convergence in the enterprise is a hot one now. Fortunately there's a good guide available for those wishing to construct a framework for addressing the issue in their companies.

A converged network can bring many business benefits to an enterprise, primary amongst them are including increased productivity and positive effects to an enterprise's financial and business goals, according to the study.

It's far too meaty a paper to satisfactorily summarize in a brief article, so here are just a few of the key benefits it explains.

Simplicity is one of the most obvious benefits of a converged network, given the reduced number of network overlays, which are costly and complex to administer. "A converged network supports a variety of applications, technologies and protocols," the paper finds, adding that the number of required platforms in the converged network is reduced, as well as the associated element and network management costs.

Dean Haddock, the Manager of Information Technology for StoryCorps, a nonprofit organization recording the lives of Americans, recently attended the open source CRM provider SugarCRM's conference and blogged about his experiences.

"Now that we're two years into our SugarCRM implementation I thought it would be good to visit the annual developer conference in San Francisco," he wrote, adding "I set out from New York to the Land of Woz to learn a little bit more."

As Haddock says, "take my advice: if you are a small and growing organization, find yourself a CRM that fits your culture and processes, and move away from the spreadsheets." Using a CRM - "especially a web-based CRM," he said, "will make sharing data and reporting on goals incredibly easy and efficient."

SugarCRM is one such CRM option, Haddock observes: "It has come a long way since its inception in 2003. Last year they changed leadership, and Larry Augustine seems to be steering the company to a slightly brighter future."

Ottawa-based MyFax, an Internet fax service , earned its fifth straight Gold Award from TopTenREVIEWS , an Internet publisher of technology and entertainment reviews.

MyFax officials said the performance reviews included more than a dozen competing Internet fax services, and the journal awarded MyFax its "Gold" or No. 1 ranking. MyFax was judged on its feature set, ease of use, customer service and price.

The service lets users send and receive faxes using an e-mail account, removing the need for a dedicated phone line and fax machine. The service enables users to manage their fax communication and corresponding document management workflow "more efficiently and at a lower cost than traditional fax servers or fax machines, regardless of physical location," company officials claim.