http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin * Fri, 13 Nov 2009 19:53:50 GMT Clearspace 2.5.5 (http://jivesoftware.com/products/clearspace/) 2009-11-13T19:53:50Z http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/im-learning-to-love-my-softphone-and-you-should-too/?cs=37497 I have to confess to being originally irritated by our transition here at the home office over to an IP-based telephony system -- primarily, I suppose, because I tend to be irritated by most all change. Not something to be proud of, but not altogether business_technology voip smbs unified_communications softphone Mon, 16 Nov 2009 15:54:10 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/im-learning-to-love-my-softphone-and-you-should-too/?cs=37497 2009-11-16T15:54:10Z 1 week, 4 hours ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/im-learning-to-love-my-softphone-and-you-should-too http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=37497 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/im-ready-to-push-away-from-the-bandwidth-buffet/?cs=37206 Net neutrality is a hot-button issue with folks who like to talk about such topics, particularly since the Obama FCC has announced it is taking up the cause.   The thing about net neutrality is that it’s hard to actually pin down what folks are business_technology obama government_agencies bandwidth_management net_neutrality fcc Tue, 03 Nov 2009 19:03:15 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/im-ready-to-push-away-from-the-bandwidth-buffet/?cs=37206 2009-11-03T19:03:15Z 2 weeks, 3 days ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/im-ready-to-push-away-from-the-bandwidth-buffet http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=37206 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/windows-7-sounds-solid-which-in-the-wake-of-vista-is-revolutionary/?cs=36828 I am like most business users, I imagine, in that I can no longer personally get all that excited about the launch of any new technology, unless that technology promises to make my life somehow easier. For example, if somebody were to announce that the windows_7 windows_vista business_technology windows_xp remote_adminisitration Tue, 20 Oct 2009 15:01:44 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/windows-7-sounds-solid-which-in-the-wake-of-vista-is-revolutionary/?cs=36828 2009-10-20T15:01:44Z 1 month, 1 day ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/windows-7-sounds-solid-which-in-the-wake-of-vista-is-revolutionary http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=36828 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/oh-boy-a-grumpy-managers-observations-on-millennials/?cs=35762 I always end up trading barbs with our Ann All whenever she blogs about “millennials,” the young, tech-savvy generation that is, in many ways, driving old farts like me to distraction.   Ann, who has the misfortune of sitting across from my office, business_culture millennials business_technology Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:03:54 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/oh-boy-a-grumpy-managers-observations-on-millennials/?cs=35762 2009-09-18T17:03:54Z 2 months, 1 week ago 1 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/oh-boy-a-grumpy-managers-observations-on-millennials http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=35762 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/better-practices-often-the-best-results-of-innovation/?cs=35477 An interesting discussion over at Harvard Business Review has consultant Susan Cramm asking readers why so many tech executives tend to discard "best practices" and set themselves up for seemingly unavoidable failure in the process.   Of course, innovation business_culture business_technology it_best_practices apple Wed, 02 Sep 2009 18:04:25 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/better-practices-often-the-best-results-of-innovation/?cs=35477 2009-09-02T18:04:25Z 2 months, 2 weeks ago 7 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/better-practices-often-the-best-results-of-innovation http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=35477 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/gmail-outages-bring-out-the-neo-luddite-in-me/?cs=35437 I don't use Gmail for business, which is a good thing today, given that I have been on the losing end of the intermittent outages that are plaguing Google's free e-mail service . However, I do use my Gmail account for a variety of reasons -- actually, gmail business_continuity google business_technology saas e-mail_and_e-mail_management Tue, 01 Sep 2009 21:10:17 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/gmail-outages-bring-out-the-neo-luddite-in-me/?cs=35437 2009-09-01T21:10:17Z 2 months, 2 weeks ago 2 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/gmail-outages-bring-out-the-neo-luddite-in-me http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=35437 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/office-xml-isnt-going-anywhere--dang-it/?cs=34989 The main thing to keep in mind as you read otherwise alarming headlines about a Texas court's ruling that Microsoft must stop selling Word, at least in its current form, is this: It's silly and will be overturned on appeal.   Alexander Wolfe at microsoft_office business_technology intellectual_property patents xml Mon, 17 Aug 2009 19:25:05 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/office-xml-isnt-going-anywhere--dang-it/?cs=34989 2009-08-17T19:25:05Z 3 months, 5 days ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/office-xml-isnt-going-anywhere--dang-it http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=34989 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/google-keeps-me-up-at-night-caffeine-or-no/?cs=34870 Like everybody else who gets paid based on the performance of a Web site, I spent about an hour today running some test searches on the sandbox of Google's new Caffeine , which Matt Cutts says is potentially the biggest update to the monolithic search search_engines google caffeine seo business_technology Tue, 11 Aug 2009 22:05:47 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/google-keeps-me-up-at-night-caffeine-or-no/?cs=34870 2009-08-11T22:05:47Z 3 months, 1 week ago 2 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/google-keeps-me-up-at-night-caffeine-or-no http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=34870 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/chrome-os-the-return-of-the-free-pc-doubtful/?cs=33969 I have trouble keeping track of how Google plans to change my life this month, but clearly this Google Chrome OS news is big, like Google Wave big from a few weeks back.   OK, enough sarcasm.   What I have been able to gather so far is that chrome_os operating_systems cloud_computing google windows business_technology Wed, 08 Jul 2009 20:00:02 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/chrome-os-the-return-of-the-free-pc-doubtful/?cs=33969 2009-07-08T20:00:02Z 4 months, 2 weeks ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/chrome-os-the-return-of-the-free-pc-doubtful http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=33969 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/quick-wins-and-the-long-view/?cs=33601 It's funny, the way your memory associates things.   As I was reading Loraine Lawson's post from last week about the wisdom of going after "low-hanging fruit," I could not stop thinking about one of my all-time favorite Warner Bros. cartoons, roi business_case business_technology strategic_planning Tue, 23 Jun 2009 19:09:36 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/quick-wins-and-the-long-view/?cs=33601 2009-06-23T19:09:36Z 5 months, 6 hours ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/quick-wins-and-the-long-view http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=33601 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/homework-vital-before-kicking-off-on-the-road/?cs=33170 I am preparing for a business trip next week.   I feel oddly guilty about it, since we opine on a weekly basis that technology is making physical locality a minor detail in getting work done.   However, this trip – to discuss a potential new project_management business_travel business_technology business_culture collaboration_software Fri, 05 Jun 2009 19:05:15 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/homework-vital-before-kicking-off-on-the-road/?cs=33170 2009-06-05T19:05:15Z 5 months, 2 weeks ago http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/homework-vital-before-kicking-off-on-the-road http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=33170 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/yep-folks-are-in-no-rush-for-new-os/?cs=32725 I am always jealous of our bloggers when I see them post something to the effect of, “A leading industry expert has just announced that she fully endorses an idea that I wrote about a month ago.”   I never get to do that, because a) I don’t blog windows_vista windows_7 windows_xp gartner business_technology Tue, 19 May 2009 19:40:20 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/yep-folks-are-in-no-rush-for-new-os/?cs=32725 2009-05-19T19:40:20Z 6 months, 5 days ago 3 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/yep-folks-are-in-no-rush-for-new-os http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=32725 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/social-media-remains-frustratingly-soft/?cs=32566 I was talking with an old friend and business associate the other day about a product he’s developing to help companies track how their brands are faring on social networks.   As I’ve noted before, I don’t really get the appeal of many social facebook twitter social_networks collaboration_software advertising_and_marketing business_technology Wed, 13 May 2009 19:17:56 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/social-media-remains-frustratingly-soft/?cs=32566 2009-05-13T19:17:56Z 6 months, 1 week ago 4 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/social-media-remains-frustratingly-soft http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=32566 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/a-little-homework-goes-a-long-way-in-project-prioritization/?cs=31694 One of the dirty little secrets of most development projects, particularly in smaller businesses, is that they often get pushed into the IT pipeline before anybody does any real homework to see if they make sense.   Sure, an idea may sound like a project_management business_case business_technology Wed, 08 Apr 2009 18:24:12 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/a-little-homework-goes-a-long-way-in-project-prioritization/?cs=31694 2009-04-08T18:24:12Z 7 months, 2 weeks ago 2 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/a-little-homework-goes-a-long-way-in-project-prioritization http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=31694 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/google-and-twitter--its-the-ads-stupid/?cs=31571 The top story at Google News Sci-Tech right now -- not surprisingly -- is heated-up rumors about Google either a) beginning serious work on, or b) being on the verge of buying Twitter.   For someone who really does not get Twitter, at least not on social_networks google advertising_and_marketing twitter business_technology Fri, 03 Apr 2009 14:18:37 GMT ken.hardin@narrowcastgroup.com http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/google-and-twitter--its-the-ads-stupid/?cs=31571 2009-04-03T14:18:37Z 7 months, 3 weeks ago 1 http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/comment/google-and-twitter--its-the-ads-stupid http://www.itbusinessedge.com/cm/blogs/hardin/feeds/comments?blogPost=31571