I've posted several times that I'm attending the Internet Telephony Expo in San Diego next week from October 10th-13th. It's going to be a huge event with thousands of people from around the world attending.

I'll be speaking in three sessions at this point.
   
Wednesday 4:30 - 5:30
The Next Wave: The Future of IP Communications Technology

The mass migration to IP-based communications technology is only beginning to reveal its true potential. As applications emerge and networks converge, as standards evolve, and as service providers continue the shift to a pure, packet-based network infrastructure, the future for IP Communications technology is brighter than ever. This special panel session will explore what the future holds for the marketplace – from new enabling technology that will provide the essential building blocks for future hardware and software solutions, to tomorrow’s breakthrough applications that will redefine the ways we work, communicate and share vital information.

This session is part of the IP Communications Business Summit put together as a workshop educating the investment community  I'll be joining Jon Arnold from J Arnold & Associates, and Ronald Gruia from Frost & Sullivan, with Marc Robins as our moderator. This is sure to be an interesting discussion of the future of the industry. I'm really looking forward to seeing what roads this discussion points down for the future.

Friday 8:45 - 9:30
Introduction to VoIP Security

While performance and availability of a VoIP system are of course extremely important, security oftentimes tops the list of concerns when deploying VoIP. In order to achieve the highest quality of service, focus must be placed on the underlying VoIP security framework. With most attacks occurring at the application level, it is imperative that companies understand the risks, and consequently design an effective security approach. By weaving security in from the onset, VoIP can be a powerful enterprise communications solution that significantly enhances worker productivity and enables cost savings. In this presentation, the speakers will address a number of security-related VoIP topics, including: • How VoIP can benefit enterprises; • Why security must be a critical focus of VoIP migrations from the onset; • Best practices in developing VoIP migration and adoption plans that maximize security; • The most dangerous VoIP vulnerabilities and the impact of network configurations on security.

I'll be moderating the panel discussion with Emmitt Wells from Getronics, Eric Rasmussen from Juniper Networks, Surya Kumar IVG from HCL Technologies, and Tom Gilheany from Nortel.

Friday 12:15 - 1:00
VoIP Security Best Practices

Behind our daily barrage of hacker attacks, announcements of new viruses and worms, and frequent risk of downtime is an opportunity. This session is an opportunity to step away from the noise and learn how to build a proactive VoIP security model. It will explain the root cause of downtime and non compliance and how to preemptively, proactively protect VoIP networks against hackers, viruses, worms, spyware and malicous insiders. Attendees will learn how IP communications applications demand a security solution that not only “borrows” from the best security functionality of the data world but adds specific VoIP protection techniques that take into account the real-time, peer-to-peer, and feature-rich nature of these session-based protocols.

I'll be moderating this panel discussion with Jonathon Weiss from Lucent Technologies, Shahadat Khan from Eyeball Networks, Dan York from Mitel (and Bluebox Podcast), and Tom Gilheany from Nortel.

I'll also be meeting with a lot of people there. I'll get to meet some fellow VoIP bloggers I've only known online like Bruce Stewart, Jon Arnold (who I'll be on a panel with), Phil Wolff and Russ Shaw. I'm also looking forward to meeting David Beckemeyer, aka Mr Blog, from TelEvolution. Lots of others, but those three have been on my "must meet" list for a long time. And I'm looking forward to finally meeting Peter Csathy from SightSpeed in person finally.

I'd originally planned on joining one of Andy Abramson's legendary wine tasting dinners. I'll be joining Andy for dinner more than once in San Diego, and these events are legendary indeed. Andy's dinners bring together not just excellent food and fantastic wines. They gather companions and friends for conversations that is truly the stuff legends are made of. I consider it a great honor that Andy has included me among his friends at these special gatherings. It's an opportunity to listen to, and witness conversations shared among some of the most brilliant industry leaders who define the next generation of unified communications technologies.

Obviously there are exhibits and chances to talk to a lot of hot companies. It's a chance to discover the next hot thing. There will be innovators who've yet to reach the public eye. And there will be products and companies on the way to fizzle there too.

I'm thankful that Rich Tehrani and the fabulous team at TMCnet graciously provide press credentials to bloggers and industry analysts like me. That helps facilitate access to some of the real movers and shakers in the industry.

I'm already scheduled to meet with folks from 911Enable, Action Tec, Paragon Wireless, snom Technology, Solegy, Sphere Communications and some others you'll hear about later.

Because I'm on the press list, I'm receiving notes from many PR firms pointing out their clients at the Expo. Offers to meet flow freely at this point as they're all looking for coverage and to make full use of their time. That's where the opportunity comes in for you. I know many of the industry blogging and journalistic colleagues I read and talk with will see this, but there are many of you who are the folks out in the trenches doing the work.  Who do you want to hear from?

If there's a company or individual with a perspective you'd like to hear, drop me an email so i can reach out and try to schedule them before the frenzy of the Expo kicks into high gear.


Technorati Tags: Internet Telephony Expo, ITExpo

Technorati Tags: ITExpo