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What are Two Things That Make Me Smile? Hockey & Wireless!

Posted October 19, 2011
Filed under: Architecture, Cellular / Mobile Phones, Cisco, Implementation/Integration, Interesting Articles, Social Media | Tags: Bypass, Cisco, Fan Vision, hockey, LA Kings, Phoenix Coyotes, stadium Wi-Fi, video, wireless

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OK, I thought I would pass along an interesting article where two of my passions – hockey and Cisco — intersect. Here is an article on Light Reading about Cisco & Verizon updating the Staples Center in Los Angeles for in-stadium video. Apparently it debuted at last night’s LA Kings game.

In-stadium connectivity is becoming increasingly more popular. This article mentions controlling several different video angles. I have a similar stand-alone device from Fan Vision that I use at Arizona Cardinals home games, although that works off of UHF technology. Fan Vision — if you are listening, *please* expand into hockey. PLEASE…

The light reading article I mentioned earlier also talks about fans ordering concessions from their seats. This is something that we already have at Coyotes hockey through a vendor called Bypass. I have tried to use the Bypass Lane at hockey games, but my in-stadium cellular signal isn’t sufficient to place the order, and there is a lack of public Wi-Fi. What makes it particularly frustrating to me is that I know the arena *has* Wi-Fi, but they don’t segment a guest SSID for public consumption. This would not only drive more sales for Bypass, but improve the overall fan experience. I can also see in-stadium Wi-Fi making it easier for fans to post pictures, videos, etc. to their favorite social networking sites, which essentially extends the team’s brand outside of the event space.

The Light Reading article also mentions social networking, in the context of “digital dissing”. I always thought they should run those boards on the jumbo tron where you text your message to a certain number, and then it plays your message. Obviously, they would have to have some good content filtering, but it would be FUN.

While I am happy for the LA Kings and the Staples Center, the Kings are in town tomorrow night to take on *my* Phoenix Coyotes. Let’s Go Coyotes!

Calling All Bloggers

Posted October 5, 2010
Filed under: blogging, Poll Questions, Social Media | Tags: Industry Survey, NHL Hockey, State of the Blogosphere, Technorati

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WiFiJedi: This is an email that I received late last week asking for bloggers to fill out a survey for a “State of the Blogosphere” report by Technorati. It took me 10-15 minutes to fill out, and was actually pretty fun/interesting. If you are a fellow blogger, I personally would appreciate you taking a few minutes of your time to help out the community by answering the survey questions. FYI — I have nothing vested in Technorati or the report, but want to get the best possible data to the public.

From: Technorati [mailto:noreply@technorati.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 30, 2010 9:51 AM
Subject: State of the Blogosphere Survey 2010

2010 State of the Blogosphere Survey – please give us 15 minutes.

Since 2004, Technorati has been tracking the Blogosphere through our State of the Blogosphere study. The goal of the study is to create a complete snapshot of the activities and interactions that make up the Blogosphere by asking you, the bloggers, to share some information about your habits. The survey includes questions like how, when and why you blog. Is this a side business, full time job or something you do for fun?

Please feel free to send this link to other bloggers you know. And be sure to check back on Technorati.com in November for a summary of the results.

The 2010 State of the Blogosphere Survey: http://research.opinionguru.com/mrIWeb/mrIWeb.dll?I.Project=A17275

WiFiJedi: As a personal side note, those who know me well understand I am a *huge* NHL Hockey fan. After completing the survey, I did see this “Five Things To Look Forward to This NHL Season” post on Technorati. #incaseyouareinterested

A Geek’s Thoughts From the Carrie Underwood Conference

Posted October 4, 2010
Filed under: Cellular / Mobile Phones, Social Media, Video | Tags: Carrie Underwood, cloud computing, Empowered, Forrester Research, intellectual property rights, Josh Bernoff, mobile computing, Social Media, Ted Schadler, video

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Last night, I attended the Carrie Underwood conference at the Jobing.com Arena in Glendale, Arizona.

One thing I couldn’t help but think during the show was how many people were using their mobile phones to take photos, record video, and share their experiences on social networking sites.

This really doesn’t do it justice, but I took this photo with my own iPhone while at the show (look at all the lights in the foreground — those are mobile phones!):

Ironically, I recently conducted a video interview of Ted Schadler on my Computerworld blog and spoke about this very topic. Ted is one of the co-authors of the new book, “Empowered”, which talks about four key technologies that are changing the way we do business — social, mobile, video, and cloud. With what I witnessed in the crowd, I couldn’t help but think Ted was *really* onto something.

To me, it reinforced that it is best to embrace these technologies, not fight them. Some artists may try to prohibit such behavior, but I think it benefits Carrie Underwood to have also those people uploading pictures and telling their friends about their experience on social networking sites. Essentially, they are advertising for her and evangelizing her brand… for free.

What do you think? Would you try to protect your intellectual property from be spread via social, mobile, video, and cloud? If so, when and how? If not, why not?

By the way, in case you were wondering, the concert was amazing. 🙂

Gestalt IT Tech Field Day

Posted August 7, 2010
Filed under: Industry Events, Social Media | Tags: Gestalt, IT Field Day, Shmoocon, Stephen Foskett, Tech Field Day

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In my last post, I highlighted one of my favorite industry events, Shmoocon. This led to me to start thinking about and researching other events, trade shows, and the like.

One interesting website that I have been researching is Gestalt IT. It appears that they have held several events in the last year connecting IT vendors w/ bloggers & other influencers. It looks like their Flagship event is called the “Tech Field Day“.

I would like to know if any of my readers have participated in one of these events as either a vendor or a delegate. What did you think — good, bad, or indifferent?!? Besides the delegates, are their other attendees? Feel free to leave a comment or email me directly at douglas <dot> haider <at> xirrus <dot> com.

Wi-Fi is Only For the Young! (Wi-Fi Busters)

Posted June 8, 2010
Filed under: Social Media, Wi-Fi Busters, Xirrus | Tags: Wi-Fi Busters, Wi-Fi myths, Wi-Fi video, Xirrus, Xirrus.tv

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Only young people use Wi-Fi. It certainly isn’t a technology that older people use. Or is it?!?

This is the topic that is explored in this short, yet informative & fun video about wireless. Enjoy!

Wi-Fi Busters Episode 1

Posted February 15, 2010
Filed under: Social Media, Wi-Fi Busters, Xirrus | Tags: health effects of Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Busters, Xirrus, XirrusTV

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My employer, Xirrus, is starting a series of videos called “Wi-Fi Busters”. Each episode will explore a certain myth around wireless communications. The first episode is around the myth that Wi-Fi causes adverse health effects.

This video is less than 3 minutes and is both fun and informative — check it out!

802.11 Heaven

Posted December 3, 2009
Filed under: blogging, General, Social Media | Tags: 802.11 Heaven, Computerworld, Jamey Kistner, Joel Barrett, Keith Parsons, Ning, Tom Carpenter

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I recently wrote on my Computerworld Blog about wireless resources on Twitter. The goal of the post was to share ways for those passionate about wireless networking and security could find one another. One of the comments to that post was from Jamey Kistner (@jameyk1stner). Jamey recommended another such community, this time on Ning.

The Ning community is called “802.11 Heaven” and is accessible at http://80211heaven.ning.com/ The website’s subtitle is “The place to chat, argue, debate and understand all things 802.11”. The site was founded by Tom Carpenter (@carpentertom), who is a CWNA and CWSP author.

To be honest, the 802.11 Heaven community is extremely small at this point, but it definitely has some of the best minds in Wi-Fi including Joel Barrett (@joelbarrett) and Keith Parsons (@keithparsons). Let’s get the word out as the value of the community is strengthened with each new member!

My thanks goes out to Jamey for highlighting this resource. Speaking of resources, you might also want to check out Jamey’s blog “Wireless Journeys”, which is available here: http://wirelessaficionado.wordpress.com/

SMX Advanced – Day 1 Recap

Posted June 3, 2009
Filed under: blogging, Industry Events, Professional Development, Security, Social Media | Tags: Link Juice, Search Engine Ranking Factors, SMX, SMX Advanced, Twitter, Twitter tactics, Twitter tools

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I was lucky enough to be up in Seattle yesterday to sit in on the sessions at SMX Advanced. SMX stands for Search Marketing Expo and SMX Advanced is one in a series of a half dozen conferences run around the world each year. Each of these conferences is dedicated to Search Marketing.

My favorite session of the morning was “Twitter Tactics and Search Marketing”. There were several presenters, including Michael Gray, President, Atlas Web Service and Joanna Lord, Co-Founder & CMO, TheOnlineBeat.

Michael was my favorite presenter of the show. His presentation was fast paced and insightful – very difficult to put into words. He started his presentation with “There is no right or wrong way to use Twitter. You need to determine what works for you”, which set a very down-to-Earth tone. Michael listed off what seemed like a thousand tools and tactics for twitter, but my favorite soundbite of his presentation is that “the re-tweet is Twitter gold“. He suggested that you RT (re-tweet) the most self-serving tweets of people you want to notice you.

Although Michael was a hard act to follow, Joanna definitely held her own. She offered great advice with regards to Twitter use and security. She suggested the following:

RESEARCH an application/tool BEFORE giving them your PASSWORD
Read.The.Link.Before.You.Push!!! (reference to the use of URL shorteners and re-tweeting links)

My favorite afternoon session talked about Search Engine Rank Factors (SERFs) in 2009 and had heavyweight presenters Rand Fishkin, CEO of SEOmoz, Laura Lippay, Dir. Technical Marketing at Yahoo, and Marty Weintraub, President of aimClear. What I took away from the session was that Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is more than meta tags, inbound links, keyword density, etc. It is about being viral, creating buzz, and creating a great product. Laura suggested asking yourself “What is it going to take to outrank our top competitor?” Simple, yet profound. I don’t think many people ask themselves this question. I think fewer people are disciplined enough to follow through with the actions needed to become #1.

Besides the great educational sessions, there was an excellent vendor in conjunction with the conference. All the large players were there such as Google, Microsoft, Facebook, and SEOmoz. Microsoft had the most interesting booth promoting their new “Bing” search engine. I particularly liked that you could use an XBox 360 controller to control maps provided by Bing. The best swag was provided by SEOmoz, who gave away cans of “Link Juice”. The LinkJuice reminded me of the case of Brawndo that I bought off the Internet before Christmas (a reference to the movie Idiocracy, if you haven’t seen it).

Unfortunately, I had to leave the conference before the evening keynote on Day 1 due to client commitments. It looked like there were some great Day 2 sessions as well as vendor sponsored parties. I am definitely going to keep Search Marketing Expo events on my radar over the coming year.

http://interop09.wordpress.com

Posted June 1, 2009
Filed under: Industry Events, Social Media, Xirrus |

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If you didn’t catch all the fun and excitement at INTEROP Las Vegas, May 17-21… well… you missed it!

Don’t fret just yet – Xirrus is giving you a second chance to experience all the fun! If you have been following my blog, you probably know that Xirrus ran a “Melee at the Mandalay” campaign with Live Men’s and Women’s Boxing. We recorded many of the matches and uploaded them to YouTube.

Additionally, we have uploaded tons of videos (boxing, product demos, interviews, etc.), pictures, and a whole lot more to a blog located at http://interop09.wordpress.com

Normally what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. Not this time! We documented all the buffoonery, to include Miss Nevada 2009 knocking out our product manager, Brian Mason (see below). Check out the blog to see what else happened!

The Importance of Tagging

Posted May 25, 2009
Filed under: blogging, Social Media | Tags: blogging, INTEROP, social bookmarking, Social Media, tagging, Twitter

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While at INTEROP last week, I met several journalists, analysts, etc. Several of them visited WiFiJedi.com and gave me feedback.

One piece of constructive criticism was that while the content was good, there was no real good way to find past material. This individual suggested that I have a tag cloud widget on my blog cross-referencing posts on a given topic.

Therefore, I have taken this suggestion and placed a tag cloud on the side bar of my blog. I have always had the drop down category box and the search field that appear below the tag cloud. At the bottom of every post, I have also tried to link to other applicable WiFiJedi.com material. Have you used these features? Do you like the tag cloud? Please let me know what you think in the comments section.

At any rate, the tag cloud coversation reminded me of one of the sessions I attended at INTEROP titled “Next Generation Search: Social Bookmarking and Tagging” by Thomas Vander Wal. Here is an oversimplified graphic from the presentation:

Interest –> Culture

Vocabulary –> Terminology

Mr. Vander Wal suggested that bookmarking and tagging turn individual interest into a shared culture and how they also turn an individual vocabulary into shared terminology.

Coincidently enough, that same day I found a Twitter service called Twittersheep that generates a tag cloud of all the terms used in the biographies of your followers. Here is what it generated from my followers:

What really jumped out at me was how much of a reflection of my background and interests are mirrored by my Twitter followers. I guess we are attracted to people who persue similar activities. Go ahead and try it and let me know if you come to a similar conclusion!