The 6:25 AM train ride to Grand Central Station was uneventful, although I have to admit that it was hard not to think about the possibilities on this September 11. A short walk lead to the security desk at JP Morgan Chase on Park Avenue. Then a bag check (no temperature was taken as in Singapore) and up to the 49th floor for the Executive Breakfast of the New York New Media Association (NYNMA). There were seventy-five or so in attendance. After my fifteen minute presentation on “The Future Of The Internet”, I introduced Chris Forbes who is CEO of Knovel Corporation (where I am a director). Chris gave an excellent presentation on how Knovel, as an information service provider, is leveraging the productivity of engineers and applied scientists. We then had a Q&A session — and the audience was not shy.
There were a lot of good questions asked of Chris about Knovel and the future of the publishing industry. Would traditional publishers continue to develop the big thick engineering reference manuals as they have always done? Chris answered that he thought it may take as long as ten years for a complete transition to modern information services but that the trend has clearly begun. Lexis/Nexis for lawyers is a proof point in another industry. There were some questions about the continued need to print web content. Both Chris and I agreed that printing is a very important aspect of the Knovel service and they offer virtually all of their content in PDF format. I plan to write a story soon about where I see printing going and the strategic role of CSS.
I talked briefly about how WiFi phones, SIP phones, and VoIP services such as Net2Phone are dramatically changing the “long distance” business. Changing in a very positive way for businesses and consumers and not so positive for the telecommunications industry. I have had a lot of feedback about my various Internet technology stories lately, especially in this particular area. Richard Shockey, Senior Manager for Strategic Technology Initiatives at NeuStar Inc. thought my comments about the “handwriting is on the wall” were conservative. He cites the very aggressive rollout of VoIP happening in major corporations as a proof point.
My story about ENUM brought a number of comments. Al Nevarez in Menlo Park, CA sees ENUM as “the last g(r)asp of traditional connection-based networking”. Al believes that VXML (voice XML) will obviate the need for ENUM. Companies such as Bevocal are offering powerful applications using voice as the driver. IBM is in this space too. Their Voice Toolkit for WebSphere Studio helps developers create voice applications that can be integrated across an enterprise. Voice XML is indeed an alternative to ENUM but I think ultimately they will go hand in hand. The most significant part of ENUM is probably as a facilitator for VOiP. However there are times when people do not want to use their voice. There also are people who are mute. Al is correct, however, that because of vxml, the “phone has essentially become a browser” and so it can take advantage of anything available on the web.
Chuck Brownstein at CNRI continues to remind me that ENUM could potentially take our eye off the ball — meaning that there are many new applications that will be integrated with VoIP. It isn’t just replicating decades-old telephone services over the Internet. He is right. I like the way Steven Greenspan, President of Omenti Research in Scotch Plains, NJ thinks about it. He feels ENUM, SIP, and POTS (plain old telephone system) will coexist for a long time and that we are now seeing the beginnings of the integration of old and new ideas. There is plenty of room for the latter and the former will keep providing some value for a long time.
The feedback this week would not be complete without hearing from some readers about geocaching. Steve Crandall has been geocaching for about a year. He told me there are some caches are on rooftops in Manhattan! He also has discovered multi-caches where you go to a cache and get directions in the form of a poem or puzzle to lead to a secondary cache a non trivial distance away. Steve added some historical perspective I was not aware of too. He says that there were puzzle maps to caches where one would sign a list or leave some change at Cal Tech in the 70s and some friends of his have said that this went on at the MIT Campus “since the dawn of time”.
Update June 20, 2013 – The company Bevocal mentioned above was acquired by Nuance in 2007 for $140 million.
