We have many developments that have taken place recently. Difficult to chronicle them all, and we didn't have the energy to qik video most, though we did do a video of our new house once we got moved in. Tired? Oh yeah! We spent the last several days moving, situating ourselves and unpacking the whole mess. Which means, ultimately, our online time has been limited.

As limited as our online time has been, we've still been doing our best to read some blog posts and generally keep up with our myriad of online/offline friends. A few posts have sort of stood our for me, forcing me to question my presence as well as my ability to maintain integrity in blogging and using various media tools.

This morning I read on Facebook a post written by Jeff Pulver. Jeff is an interesting guy. One of my favorite reads actually. He intrigues me because his mind is incredible. He has more ideas than probably anyone I know. But maybe it just seems that way?

What Jeff Pulver has the ability to do is capture a thought and express it, garnering a great deal of consideration in the world of technology. That is something I wish I could do. Not necessarily garner the attention, though obviously I am an attention seeker, but have my thoughts matter somehow, yes.

This morning is no different with regard to my enjoyment of Jeff's writing. His post, "The Digital “Me” - Welcome to Life 3.0", talked about living digitally and how people know each other in todays world. He suggests that people may think they know him because he is so public, writing, using video, audio and really so many different tools to get his content displayed in one way or another, but the question really is do we know him? I mean, is it possible to have enough content out there that people truly know you even if they have never met you or talked to you? I wonder about that.

Ken and I post to a lot of different places for a variety of reasons. We post pictures to flickr to share with our family and friends what we're up to. We post to our blogs, our thoughts and our visions. We post to twitter to give quick updates or touch base. Facebook we use as a sort of playground as well as a place to see what some of our non twittering friends are up to, and jaiku we use to have conversations with people, sometimes only chiming in to something someone we know has thrown out there for discussion. We do use video on seesmic and a few other places, though most of our video goes through our GeekSpeak TV show.

Why did I mention all of that? I still want to know if people think they really know me/us because of all they read. On the one hand I think there are things people absolutely know that they wouldn't know unless reading and paying attention to our various feeds. But who am I? Does the digital life make it easier or more difficult for people to connect and really gain a sense of who those they follow are?

My 2 cents... for family members, the non-tech sector and even some of the more tech savvy family and friends we have, our various postings absolutely allow them into our lives to share and almost feel they are participating with us. But here's the catch. Those people actually know us. They have a sense of our value system, our views of the world. They know, for instance, the struggle I had in getting a treatment for my son to improve his bone density. They also know how much energy I spent at hospitals and doctors offices while he was being cast or getting the casts off. They know other things too, like what my favorite color is, that I don't like onions because I get nauseated when I eat them. (I won't mention what they know about Ken because he can divulge that or not as he sees fit)

I think maybe it's not possible to know as much as we think we can just by reading feeds. My sense is that it can prevent the actual interaction because people don't feel they need to communicate as long as they can catch up reading the various posts. I also think our society is becoming less interactive physically and more interactive technologically. I don't honestly know if thats a good thing or a bad thing but it is part of the evolution we're all taking part in. My guess is that we won't learn the really important things if we stop meeting each other face to face. I just wonder where we're all going to wind up. Is it possible to be too connected? Time will tell. In the meantime, I'm going to go read a blog.

        

I've been spending less time here and more time on Stardust Global Ventures, largely because we have been really trying to gain some momentum over there for our video/business aspirations. Here is a link to the latest GeekSpeak TV episode 3. We have just purchased a new Sony video camera so the audio and video should improve over the next few times.

A quick mention lest I forget, Dan Lynch of shedmusic.net has created the new theme tune. We're very happy with it and can't wait to see Dan gain some notoriety with all he has done for me and a few of our friends. We think Dan is incredibly talented. Check his site out and contact him!

GeekSpeak TV

        

While having dinner on Ken's birthday, I considered, once again, how little people know of those they pay attention to. HUH? How can people be paying attention and know nothing?

What I mean is this, Ken Camp is a VOIP expert, he's many other things as well, not the least of which is my partner and fiance, but people follow him because of his vast knowledge. I did. But what don't you know?

The following podcast is our chat after we came home and sat on our living room sofa. You may learn one or two things you didn't know before. He's an interesting man!

Download | Duration: 00:30:46

        

Many of you who follow along here on Gabby Geek, also know my business partner Ken Camp. This past week Ken and I stepped into new roles when we attended VON.x in San Jose. VON is a brainchild of Jeff Pulver.  Jeff has come to mean a great deal more to me than you might expect. Why? Because he and Ken cooked up a big surprise for me.

This last Tuesday, March 18th, Ken Camp proposed to me while we were presenters at the VONCamp Unconference. I accepted, of course.    Ken is a wonderful man. I love him so much, and I intend spending life with him on an incredible journey of learning, exploring, growing and aging. Yes, unfortunately we are doing that.

One of the most memorable things that occurred was our ability to have David with us. David took phenomenal pictures of our engagement as well as pictures of people and events we enjoyed. I was thrilled to have David witness the engagement. Thrilled he was happy and thrilled we all had such a great time.

Ken's Proposal!!!

 My son, David.

        

Ken and I have been actively participating in the Squawkbox Conference call podcast series almost every day. Alec Saunders of iotum (the company that built the FREE Conference Call application) hosts the call. This week, Alec is off skiing for spring break with his boys and enjoying life. Several of us have pitched in to host the call each day this week.

On Thursday, Ken and I will be hosting Squawkbox for March 13th. We hope you’ll come join us. We’re working on a special guest, and really hoping he’ll be able to make the call. As soon as we know for certain who our guest will be, we’ll get the Facebook pages and notes updated.

We hope you come join us on Squawkbox!

        

Ken and I finally did our first recorded GeekSpeak TV show. We think it's pretty fun, but in truth we had a teensy issue with the very beginning audio. We hope you'll follow as we try to launch ourselves into a more public scene.

        

Splinternet or Legitimizing Online Socialization?

        

Last year the O’Reilly ETel event was perhaps the most exciting conference venue in the industry. O’Reilly wasn’t able to continue the event, but that’s not enough to let something so exciting and powerful fade away. Thanks to the tireless efforts of Lee Dryburgh, this year we’ll see the kickoff of eComm2008. It’s what we believe will be the first of a revitalized, high-energy conference that will set the industry aflame with passion and innovation.

The conference takes place at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, CA from March 12th-14th.

Established in 1996, the Computer History Museum is a public benefit organization dedicated to the preservation and celebration of computing history. It is home to one of the largest collections of computing artifacts in the world, a collection comprising over 13,000 objects, 20,000 images, 5,000 moving images, 4,000 linear feet of cataloged documentation and 5,000 titles or several hundred gigabytes of software. The mission of the Computer History Museum is to preserve and present for posterity the artifacts and stories of the information age. As such, the Museum plays a unique role in the history of the computing revolution and its worldwide impact on the human experience.

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Here’s just a small sampling of speakers on the agenda. These are just a few that are my personal highlights. Check the speakers page for a complete list.

Bob Frankston

Frankston Innovating, Achieving connectivity from the edge.

Bob Frankston may be best known for writing VisiCalc. He has been working on online services and networks since 1966 and while at Microsoft initiated the home networking effort. Since then he’s focus his attention on a post-telecom model that builds on the Internet dynamic to achieve connectivity from the edge rather than the center.

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Brough Turner

NMS Communications, SVP and CTO

Brough Turner is SVP, CTO and co-founder of NMS Communications wherehe oversees evolution of technology and product architectures andworks on business strategy and new market development. Brough writesand is quoted widely on telecommunications topics in trade and generalbusiness publications and he is a frequent speaker at telecom industryevents around the world. His current interests include mobilewireless access, broadband policy, mobile video, and user createdcontent and communities. Brough blogs athttp://blogs.nmss.com/communications/ on the technology, economic andsocial issues of communications at the intersection of telecom,mobility and the Internet.

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David Isenberg

Awaiting…, Founder

David S. Isenberg spent 12 years at AT&T Bell Labs until his 1997 essay,”The Rise of the Stupid Network,” was received with acclaim everywhere in the global telecommunications community with one exception — at AT&T itself! So Isenberg left AT&T in 1998 to found isen.com, LLC (an independent telecom analysis firm based in Cos Cob, Connecticut) and to publish The SMART Letter, an open-minded commentary on the communications revolution and its enemies.

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Jeff Bonforte

Yahoo! Inc., Vice President, Product Management

Jeff has founded a few startups including i-drive, an online storage pioneer, in 1998. He served as President for SIPphone, where he lead the development and release of Gizmo Project (www.gizmo5.com). He began working at Yahoo! in 2005, where he initially lead Voice. Shortly after, he was promoted to run Messenger, Voice and Chat. He was promoted to Vice President in 2007. Today he works in early product development in Search.

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Lee S Dryburgh

SS7 Networks Limited, Director

Lee S. Dryburgh is a person-to-person communications technologist. He is an engineering doctoral candidate at UCL (with sponsorship from Cisco), SS7 consulting engineer via his company SS7 Networks and the initiator of the Emerging Communications (eComm) conference. He has performed work for numerous operators including British Telecom, O2, Sprint, T-Mobile, Orange, Verisign, Hutchinson, as well as vendors including Marconi, Nokia, Alcatel-Lucent, Nortel, and Cisco. He is an acknowledged expert in the telecommunication protocol suite Signaling System #7 and lead-authored the bestselling book on the topic. His research focus is the future of telephony and enabling conversation between relevant strangers.

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Martin Geddes

STL, Chief Analyst

Martin Geddes is author of the popular telecom strategy blog Telepocalypse, as well as chief analyst at STL and co-instigator of the Telco 2.0 initiative (www.telco2.net) — helping network operators and vendors make money in an all-IP world.

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Thomas McCarthy-Howe

The Thomas Howe Company, CEO

Thomas McCarthy-Howe has nineteen years of experience in telecommunications product development. He is currently an independent consultant to service providers, enterprises and equipment vendors in the design and development of next generation communications equipment and services. Thomas has held senior management and engineering positions at industry leaders such as Comverse, Versatel Networks, PictureTel and Aware. As a member of the PictureTel engineering team, Mr. Howe designed audio and video software of the first PC-based video conferencing system, as well as software for the original version of NetMeeting, and as Aware Inc.’s software architect for the first commercially available ADSL chipset. In 2007, Thomas won the O’Reilly Emerging Telephony Mashup Contest. In addition to his writing and teaching, he currently serves on several technical advisory boards and boards of directors.

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That list is just a few of the fabulous speakers on the eComm agenda. Yes, those were chosen because they represent some personal friends we look foward to spending time with, but they’re also trusted colleagues who represent the voice of wisdom in the industry. The speaker’s list for this event is incomparable with that of many conferences.

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Looking over the agenda yields such a depth and breadth of conversations that this is truly an even not to be missed.My partner Ken and I are making sure we won’t miss it. We’ll be there, and expect to be presenting one of the lightning talks on the last day. We’ll be talking about why enabling a hyperconnected state with voice and data services is one of the most vital competitive differentiators in the industry.

We’re also lined up to speak should schedules change or anyone’s travel plans go awry. We will definitely be there blogging, interviewing, podcasting, doing video, and sharing the excitement and frenzy of action from the conference.

We hope you’ll look for us and come say hello. We want to meet and talk with as many of you as possible.

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Special BonusThe cost of this conference is already low, one of the lowest cost conferences in the industry. Early bird registration is still in effect right now, for another $300 off.

As a special bonus if you email either Sheryl or Ken, we’ll provide a special discount code that will get an additional 15% discount. The early bird registration will end soon, so make your plans now.

Drop us an email to let us know if you’re going to be there so we can set aside time to meet in person.

        

Pat Phelan tagged me to write an '8 things you don't know about Me' meme. I don't think I have ever done that before, but I thought it was a good time to tell everyone something about me.


1. While many of you know I have two kids, a 25 yr old daughter and 16 yr old son, what you don't know is that my son has a bone disorder, osteogenesis imperfecta, or brittle bones, which is tons easier to remember.

2. I was born in a small town called Walla Walla. Many of you recognize the name due to a song the Chipmunks sang back in the 'olden days', as my kids would say.

3. I love wine. Ok, that you may all know, but it only takes about 1 1/2 glasses before I get goofy. (I'm a cheap date)

4. I'm American but lived in Canada from 1998 until 2007

5. I like animals but am particularly fond of cats. Rarely have I spent time without one owning me.

6. I used to perform in a jazz band when I was a kid as the main; I also played clarinet

7. I no longer have any parents living

8. I quit smoking cold turkey after close to 30 years at it.


I wrote this in the same sort of way Pat wrote his, on a personal level instead of professional level. I will pass this on to people who have become incidental partners in my recent life changes. In other words, people I am interested in getting to know better. (In no particular order)

1. PhoneBoy
2. Euan Semple
3. Andy Abramson
4. Dannie Jost
5. Luca Filigheddu      (whose name should be easier to spell)
6. Cathryn Hrudicka
7. jrnoded James Roberts indeed! ;o)
8. Ken Camp (You had to know I'd tag you!)

        

I realized Christmas was different this year. It is the first year I can remember in recent times, that hasn’t involved the gifting of some electronic gadget.  Of course there were many differences, but I can’t overlook that one.  That is significant.

What do you give two of the most hyper connected people on the planet for a gadget? I could have gotten an N810. I could have given one, too! I didn’t and Ken didn’t. I’m not sure why. We shopped, spent hours online and in malls shopping. The truth is, not one time did either of us even mention we hoped to receive a nifty or hot gadget. Who’d a thunk?

Don’t think nothing was thought of, or nothing was purchased to enhance connectivity. I did get some stocking stuffer U3 drives. (4 gig each) I certainly purchased a few gadgets for the kids. Michelle got a new Nokia cell phone (I bought a plan so she can actually use it!) I got David an ipod nano. We’re just trying to figure out how to put music on it with my itunes. That is a lesson in frustration. Actually the gifts for both the kids were frustrating from the human perspective.

First, David has a nano and I have an original video ipod 30 gig. In other words my itunes, and all the music is attached to MY ipod. I can authorize a computer to access the itunes or share with it. I don’t want to do that though. I want to give him only HIS music. I want to keep my pictures and my files intact on MY pc and not share to his nano all my pictures. David doesn’t want many of my files, either music or picture. I finally got itunes to only add the pictures that he wants and I made sure to NOT register his ipod. He must do that when he gets home.

Moving right along. ;o)

Michelle’s new mobile phone. Hm, well, it’s not a top of the line nokia, but still quite nice. We needed her to have the ability to call or text us when she comes for a visit. Michelle has gotten lost every time she has come here, and we have had to drive to meet her and find her. (Next year is a gps!!!!!)

Once opened, we had to activate the new phone. Well…we tried to read the instructions, but we kept getting directed to the ‘buy a new phone’ page. I didn’t want to buy a new phone because I already had. Eventually we did get it activated and we discovered Michelle is a bad as her mom. She LOVES texting and LOVES ,gadgets. She always maintained she would never use them, but once in her hot little hands. Michelle was using a cell phone like she had for years. ;o)

That is really the end of the holiday story. Mostly. Between us we got books, a leather jacket (red and MINE) clothes, kitchen gadgets (cuisinart espresso maker etc.) Ken designed a gorgeous dog tag, (necklace) for me with a special phrase. I got Ken a collector Peter Pan original book. Traditional stuff mostly.

It was a nice Christmas. But it’s over. Times are changing. I wonder what gadget will be important next year? I bet we’ll both covet something. That’s what we do. It’s what brought us together. Certainly one aspect of it.

Happy Holidays since Christmas is over for now.

        

Many of you know I have 2 children. Children, hm, maybe a re wording is in order? Michelle is 25 and David is 16.

Just before US  Thanksgiving we all three sat down and had a rather informal conversation, albeit with a microphone, about how cell phones and technology in general is different, and used differently, based on age.

Interestingly enough, because my kids are 9 years different in age there is good information to be considered. I hope to do another podcast with them at Christmas time. I also hope to get it up much faster than I got this one up. ;o)

Thanks for you patience.


Sheryl

Download | Duration: 00:13:59

 

Merry Christmas

        

'Tis the season, so I've heard. ;o)

This year is quite a different year for me. I've been busy with a move that occurred a couple months ago. Planning for a holiday where both of my kids must come to visit me for Christmas. Working on business outlines, business planning, shopping, two out of town trips in the last two months. In many ways I feel overwhelmed.

As the holiday season gets more and more under way, I find myself losing time but still want to maintain the occasional touch with the people who pay attention to what is happening in the Gabby Geek realm.

My daughter is friends with Chris Pirillo people, and she does something I'm sure I don't understand on his website. She gave me a link to see Santa. Apparently he appears on Ustream nightly at 8 EST, 5 PST. Here you go. Enjoy ;o)

Santa on Ustream

        

I attended ITExpo in September, and met some incredible people. Lesley Kirchman, of Actiontec/VoSKY, was one of my more memorable encounters.

Lesley  Kirchman is a phenomenal woman who excels in business without losing sight of her list of priorities. Lesley is a focused  business woman, but for her, family doesn't take a backseat.

What I realized, as a woman who has never been forced to make choices about family versus business, is that todays woman still must make concessions. Lesley makes it appear a seamless transition, and one hardly worth mentioning. I mention it because it is inspiring to me, and I believe it is this dedication to family and self that makes todays woman an incredible part of the forging of new roles and new ideologies.

This is Lesley. Someone I was lucky enough to have an opportunity to spend some time with. Someone I plan to meet again.

Download | Duration: 00:23:31

        

Dameon Welch-Abernathy, as I mentioned to him, the 'biggest' name in the history of communications. Ok, it might not be, but it is a LONG one.

This was one of the most fun podcasts for me because it was with someone I have wanted to interview for a long time. In truth I had little to do but turn him loose. Dameon is Phoneboy. Who doesn't know Phoneboy?

This is where Phoneboy talks.

Sheryl

Download | Duration: 00:33:12

        

Stephane Marceau, President and CEO of Mobivox, is such a fascinating man! I should explain that I met Stephane at a dinner  hosted by a mutual friend while I was in L.A. last month at the ITExpo. Stephane sat across from me and I got to spend some time chatting with him.

This podcast is one I really just got to sit in on but am privileged to have the opportunity to post about. My partner, Ken Camp, is the true lead for this podcast, but I contributed something, really!

I hope you enjoy another Incidental Interview. 

The Gabby Geek
S

Download | Duration: 00:11:49

        

For first time listeners, this is a collaboration of sorts between my business partner, Ken Camp, who also happens to be my housemate, and me. 

Ken and I have now shared a house for 2 weeks and as time has gone by we have had a few obstacles, not the least of which is my recent illness which required a doctor visit. The doctor visit was the inspiration for this particular podcast.

I hope as we progress you will write with any suggestions you may have and also please leave comments.

Enjoy this latest version of, When Geeks Collide.

Download | Duration: 00:19:00

        

Hello! It's been awhile since I was here and posted a podcast, largely due to life changes. I recently moved from Canada back to my birth country, USA, and have been wading through all the issues around that.


This particular episode of Incidental Interviews is actually a pre cursor to a business idea between myself and my partner Ken Camp. We have recently joined together as business partners and room mates. ;o) Working together to set up a household is certainly an interesting undertaking when you have 2 people merging not only their personalities but their geek tools/toys!

This was a fun evening for Ken and I, where, sitting having wine after dinner we simply engaged in a conversation. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.
 

Download | Duration: 00:23:25

        

Today is a momentous occasion because not only do I get the opportunity to interview a man I find fascinating, I got to do it with my co-host and friend Ken Camp. Ken has agreed to partner up with me on a semi- regular basis, which translated means once or more a month. I am thrilled to have him share this with me. No one I'd want more.

Randal Schwartz. A name and yet so much more. I first met Randal Schwartz on a social network called Jaiku. Not long after, I had the oportunity to meet Randal in person on the set of the TV show, The Lab With Leo Laporte.

After seeing Randal in person I realised I wanted him on my show, but how to convince him he wanted to come on? My best friend and business partner, Ken Camp, went on a campaign with me to encourage and prod Randal into an appearance. He finally capitualted and this is the result.

Randal is a funny man and far too smart for his own good. I hope you enjoy getting to know the famous Perl hacker as much as we did.

Download | Duration: 00:31:09

        

ITExpo Update

I wanted to take this time to do a quick update for those of you who read my page. I was fortunate enough to attend TMCnet's ITExpo. I was granted a press pass and all I really had to do was show up. Show up I did and I had the most amazing adventure in my recent history.

Upon arrival I met up with my great friend and business partner, Ken Camp of Realtime Community/ Unified Communications. Ken was actually the one who suggested I go, and while nothing has been said my suspicion is he had something to do with the reception I received.

I'm not going to bore you with all the details of a novice conference attendees assessments, but I will say that the people I met, Todd Landry of Sphere Communications, Jim Heising of Telephony2, Stephane Marceau of Mobivox, David Tang and Lesley Kirchman of Vosky, and Ken Kuenzel of Convergence. I also met Andy Abramson of Comunicano, one of the great moments because I was allowed to attend one of Andy's many famous dinners where he brings wine from his own private wine cellar. It was everything I had heard it would be and the food was really super, too.

Of course I met many others, and as great as it all was, what really was exciting for me was just attending. Seeing all the work and all the people involved with the tools I love and we all use.

What this post is about, ultimately, is my friend Ken's podcast and post. He actually did podcasting while we attended. Ken moderated 2 panels and had briefings with many people. I took pictures of the various meetings and sat in on a few.

So without further ado.... here we go!
MP3: Ken Camp - ITExpo Panel Podcast - Extending Security to the Unified Communications User Community

        

This is a repost of my original interview with Peter Csathy, CEO of SightSpeed.
I thought for those who want just an audio feed for their mp3 players I would do a post of the audio to make it easier to find. Please refer to my notes on Episode 3 for any information you might have missed.

Let me just reiterate, Peter Csathy was a great interview. He is intelligent, and interesting. I appreciate his time and his willingness to work with someone new to the field of broadcasting. He was a real gentleman and I can not speak highly enough if his professionalism as well as his knowledge of how to run business. He is an amazing man, one I would love to meet in person some day.

Thanks Peter! I enjoyed myself.

Download | Duration: 00:26:43