"Even though I have 2,992 names in my PDA, I never seem to have the phone number I really need."

That's from the president and CEO of Akamai Technologies, so if there are problems at that level of technological reach, we're guessing you're having a couple too.

But he found a solution via the Personal Directory application on Parlance Corporation's nameConnector speech-enabled call routing service. A Personal Directory is an application which "has proved popular with customers," according to Parlance officials.

With this application, customer employees can each set up and maintain their own nameConnector call directories that can be accessed anywhere, anytime by speaking their password at the main nameConnector greeting.

Fujitsu has "launched its global cloud strategy, rooted in Fujitsu's view of cloud computing as having four modes of consumption: infrastructure, application, activity and content."

According to industry observer David Hamilton, "customers will be offered non-disruptive ways of joining any, some or all of the four modes."

The initial infrastructure-as-a-service, the company notes, is just the first stage in its view of the evolving cloud computing model.

According to its Thursday announcement, the company developed its four-part strategy through their "real experience in working with customers on cloud computing and delivery across the world."

In December 2009, Fujitsu America launched cloud services for end-to-end ICT products, which company officials at the time said were "particularly in the manufacturing, retail, healthcare, government, education, financial services and communications sectors."

It's a given, of course, that 97 percent of the products included in "The Home of the Future" features never actually get invented. Despite the never-ending fascination with such lists and such geekier-than-thou possibilities, the home today looks remarkably similar to the home of the 1950s.

Still, it's that three percent that keeps life interesting. To that end, then,  industry observer Rob Enderle looks at the potential for Marvell's just-launched Avanta line, "which could enable a whopping 10-gigabit network - or about 100 times what most folks now have."

Okay, forget the space-age design salt and pepper shakers. This could be something worth looking into.

At a recent show Enderle saw a potential home conferencing system. Instead of the typical widescreen HD TV view of "a bunch of other folks looking at you in the same way," he notes, "Marvell flipped a big TV into portrait format, so you could walk up and talk to the remote person much as if you were standing in front of them."

There are your normal hum-drum business meetings held via Web conference, where the sales team in Pittsburgh assembles to run through the numbers with the head office in Milwaukee... nodded perfunctory greetings, disembodied heads floating on the screen... Starbucks cups raised here and there...

Then there are more lively uses for video conferencing: India's The Central Bureau of Investigation is seeking permission from the special court trying Satyam Computers' former chairman B. Ramalinga Raju in a billion-dollar scam to examine him through video-conferencing.

"Raju is not able to appear before the court as he is hospitalized. Based on NIMS health report, we will decide on filing a petition requesting the court to examine him through video conferencing or any other means," CBI's deputy legal advisor B Ravindranath told PTI.

Industry observer Dan Miller evaluates the Fuze Box update, Fuze Meeting online conferencing service, finding that the company is "hoping the improvements will give it an edge over rivals WebEx and GoToMeeting."

Like those other two, Miller says, Fuze Meeting "lets you set up meetings online. You can share your screen, upload meeting materials for online presentation, talk to meeting participants via teleconference, and record the proceedings."

Last October TMC's Raju Shanbhag reported that Fuze Box announced that its Fuze Meeting facility is now generally available for the BlackBerry Storm, BlackBerry Bold and BlackBerry Curve 8900 smartphones.

Since launching the service last year, Miller says, Fuze Box "has been trying to differentiate it from WebEx and GoToMeeting on several fronts." And there are differences - Fuze Meeting doesn't require a software client, being entirely Web-based, and claims its service supports higher-resolution graphics than its competitors, "making it particularly good for creative professionals," Miller notes.