I’m looking forward to attending ITExpo January 20th – 22nd in Miami, Florida. The lineup of Keynote speakers for this conference is fantastic. I’ll be listening especially closely to Brian Higgins, Executive Director of Ecosystem Development for Verizon Wireless. It’s refreshing, if not surprising, to see one of the big boys at a conference all about innovation.
I have the pleasure of speaking on two panels at this event, one focusing on Cloud Communications and the other on CEBP implementations and fundamentals – two topics that are very near and dear to us at Jaduka. The Cloud Communications Summit will also draw a wide audience. Many enterprises can see the light at the end of the [...]

Jaduka Exchange has been a bit quiet lately as all hands have been busy launching new applications of our on-demand voice communications services for partners such as Strikeiron and Appian. We are now readying a pilot launch of our in store feedback service, CommentFunnel.
Jaduka’s CommentFunnel service is a consumer-facing voice application for businesses with physical brick-and-mortar store locations, such as grocery stores, department stores and big box specialty retailers.  Built around our core Jaduka Diary service, CommentFunnel lets organizations effortlessly enable real-time capture of consumer feedback—in the voice of the customer—at the point of sale.
The service works by allowing shoppers in retail store locations to dial a posted toll free number using their mobile phones [...]

I am here today to chew bubblegum and write about technology, cake, and death. I appear to be all out of bubblegum, however, so it is time to move on and write about why I think the question of “Cake or death?” is not only related, but relevant to, a discussion about technology.
First, let me give credit where credit is due. One of my favorite stand-up comedians, Eddie Izzard, does a great bit that asks the question, “Cake or death?” I caught one of his performances the other night, tuning in right about the point where he did his “Cake or death?” bit.
“Cake or death?” That’s a pretty easy question. Anyone could [...]

Before I explain the cryptic title, I have to give thanks to Dean Bubley for another acronym. UTFP stands for “Under the Floor Provider”, better known as our current Telcos. The future for Telcos is being referred to as the plumbing and dumb pipe providers. Let’s add another acronym to the mix.
While attending the Telco 2.0 Conference in Nice, Dean posed a question about “Under the Floor Providers” implementing the “Over the Top” (OTT) services and a unified API strategy. I’m not sure he ever answered his question, as I was too busy writing down the new acronym. This question was raised during a session about APIs, the best way to monetize, deliver and standardize, [...]

A comment I overhead at SaaScon that I can’t get out of my head and I believe speaks volumes for how SaaS will soon dominate premise-based solutions goes something like this: “Companies are now using SaaS monitoring solutions to monitor their SaaS applications.” Who would have imagined?
Take a premise-based solution and a SaaS based solution and I can’t imagine why anyone would choose premise over SaaS—can you?
Let’s see, a premise-based solution requires:

A server or set of servers for the solution to run on.

Facility space for this server or set of servers.

Cooling costs for this server or set of servers.

Networking costs for this server or set of servers.

Someone to manage the server [...]

In the last 24 hours Ben Bernanke says he can see the light at the end of the economic tunnel and Austin-based Vignette is the newest acquisition of Canadian content management experts Open Text.
Two things to notice here. First, we’re in for at least several months more of what, according to Bernanke, will amount to further consolidation and acquisition before current conditions of market uncertainty draw to an end. Second, when current market conditions of uncertainty draw to an end, it will be precisely those companies that, like Open Text, have not only weathered the storm, but have grown and added new functionality that stand the most to gain.
If you’re an applications developer this means [...]

Every toolset evolves. Archaeological evidence validates the historic progression of and improvements in prehistoric hunting tools over hundreds and thousands of years. Metal ore and heat were combined in ways that gave tools the ability to withstand chipping, breaking or other types of damage. Over time, toolmakers engaged in problem definition, tool creation and improvement. Evolution is a constant.
There is a parallel with communication tools used in enterprises today. As work group managers, we are constantly seeking ways to overcome communication, workflow and process problems. Once we identify a problem we run to the IT staff — the “tools craftsman” of today — to help us solve it. We explain, “I need this data in [...]

“Well, the problem is that SOAP is hard.”
It’s early 2007 and I’m dead in the middle of a conversation with a friend at PayPal.
“We were certain that developers accessing the eBay product data would want everything in SOAP and it just made sense to do it that way. It wasn’t right, though. Turns out, SOAP is hard.”
This is neither the first nor the last time I’d find myself submerged in the ‘what-counts-as-too-hard for data access?’ conversation, or the ‘so-who-are-our-users-REALLY?’ conversation that’s never too far behind. Every year sees the addition of yet more developers working in yet more languages inside of even more frameworks than ever before. And the unspoken corollary [...]

The time spent at SaaScon09 last week has only further validated my belief that Software as a Service (SaaS) is not a technology fad, nor is it just one more IT acronym for O’Reilly to fill that last remaining space on your bookshelf.
As I reflect on the many conversations I had, and the feedback I received at SaaScon, I feel more confident than ever that SaaS has become a widely accepted and trusted model that companies are quickly moving towards.
CFOs like SaaS over premised-based solutions because costs savings are paramount: there are no infrastructure costs (i.e. migrate from CAPEX to OPEX). SaaS offers a pay-as-you-go or subscription-based billing models (i.e. pay for what you use). [...]

An article this morning on mobile commerce - “Survey Says: Retailers Need to Go Mobile” - referenced a recent survey conducted by Foresee Results that reported nearly a third of online shoppers said they used their mobile phone as part of their regular shopping trip. Whether used for calling or texting a friend for advice prior to making a purchase, or for taking a picture of a product with their mobile phone and sending it to themselves to look at it later from home, the mobile phone has become an important tool that consumers use when making purchase decisions. The article went on to explain the need for brick-and-mortar retailers to consider developing and [...]