Being the last one to something is not always a bad thing. Case in point: I was just contacted to be a delegate for Network Field Day 23 (#NFD23) and it is only next week. As this is a virtual event I do not have to travel anywhere. Fortunately, my afternoons happen to be open enough that I can attend almost all of it. So, why is it good that I am the last person invited? Because compared to all the other delegates I have the least amount of time to be looking forward to the event.
Tom Hollingsworth (@NetworkingNerd) reached out to me about attending and, since my calendar has enough openings, I was able to say yes. Today, I spent some time handling the prerequisites for delegates. This included completing some online forms and answering some emails.
Then I looked at the companies that are going to be speaking. There are some big names that I am really looking forward to hearing from. Cisco, Juniper, and Palo Alto are on the list. I have heard some great presentations from these vendors before, so I expect something great from each one. Cisco has a huge array of products and I am curious which of their products they are going to be speaking about. At NFD22, I heard from both Palo Alto Networks and CloudGenix on their SD-WAN offerings. Since then, Palo Alto Networks has acquired CloudGenix. Could there be an update on how these two SD-WAN offerings are working even better as one? I used to work on Juniper products years ago and they are one of the bigger names in networking so it will be good to hear their current direction.
There are two chip manufacturers coming to speak: Intel and Broadcom. I heard from Broadcom at NFD 22 and even wrote about it: http://www.itsecdef.com/broadcom-processors-are-blazingly-fast/. Their presentations were technical but in a good way. I had to re-watch them just to absorb most of it. I am really hoping that the Intel team watched those, too. If they took notes, they could deliver a powerful presentation considering their product line.
The remaining companies may be smaller but they have some good topics. There are some companies working with intent based networking such as Apstra, Arista, and IP Fabric. Others are working with analytics and performance management such as Catchpoint and PathSolutions. The last one is Airvine, which claims to be working on the “next frontier of millimeter-wave wireless communications” but their website has no details except that they are in stealth mode. Could this be their big unveiling?
The only way to find out about these presentations is to watch next week. Head on over to the NFD23 site (https://techfieldday.com/event/nfd23/ ) to learn more and see information about all the delegates (including me). My wait time is less than a week so not much time to go. If you have any good questions for these companies, feel free to reach out to me.
Recently, I had the opportunity to help with a Cisco Champion Radio podcast regarding a new product called SecureX. This was a great discussion with Ben Greenbaum, an engineer from Cisco. Besides being a smart engineer, he also has a great beard. Ok – you cannot see his beard on this podcast but you can hear his enthusiasm about SecureX. Helping out with this episode was Ben Story which you can head over to https://packitforwarding.com/ to read his blog.
Hot off the presses with some more details about CiscoLive 2020. The teams at Cisco are really working overtime to bring the event together. There is not a lot of time left but still plenty for them to do.
Stay tuned this week as the event scheduler will be going live. The event website (CiscoLive) shows us that there are four channels to choose from. This means four streams that you can watch during the event. If you read my last post (Another Inside Scoop on CiscoLive) then you may remember that you will be able to channel surf. So, why do we need an event scheduler? As long as you are registered you will be able to go to any of the channels but you need to know what is available and the event scheduler is your first look.
Fortunately, I received a preview of the schedules and I can tell you there is some pretty interesting content being planned. Now, it is not all set and there are some surprises that they are not going to let out until later. But, let me tell you what I do know.
For starters, each day starts with a keynote similar to the in-person event. The first day’s keynote includes the business vision and Cisco solutions on security and collaboration. This will be given by VP & GM of Collaboration Javed Khan, SVP and GM of Security Gee Rittenhouse, and (of course) Chairman and CEO Chuck Robbins. The second day’s keynote is about the technological vision with some comprehensive demos. This one will be given by SVP of Emerging Tech & Incubation Liz Centoni, SVP of Americas CX Alvio Barrios, and SVP and GM of Mass-Scale Infrastructure Jonathan Davidson. Make sure to tweet during these keynote because prizes will be awarded.
Cisco Keynote Speakers
Once those Keynotes are over, there is still plenty of content but broken into the four channels. In the Possibilities Channel you will find technology innovations, customer spotlights, and a couple of guest speakers. The Innovation Channel will offer content about harnessing your network, secure business communications & collaborations, Cisco’s Connected Experience portfolio, and innovation for transformation. The IT Heroes Channel holds the technology including application experience in the multicloud, enabling flexible workspaces, unleashing 5G & Wi-Fi 6, and SecureX (a product I am really looking forward to hearing more about). Finally, in the IT Leadership Channel, you will find conversations with the Cisco CIO, discussions on being an inclusive leader in times of crisis, an executive Q&A, and more guest speakers (including one that knows a lot about presidential history).
But that is not all. Cisco is working on some surprise musical talent. They are still negotiating so I could not find out who that includes but was told that it will be good. Lastly, I was told that one of the guest speakers could be described as “an NFL Hall of Fame athlete.” To view the bands and surprise guest speakers, you need to be registered. One part of the event that looks interesting is the end of the day speaker on day 1: Sekou Andrews who is the “world’s leading poetic voice.” If you want to hear more about him, check out his YouTube video at https://youtu.be/YVCEd6Qr8KA.
If you have not already done so, head on over to the event site (CiscoLive) and register. While you are there, check out the contests – they are still looking for some good virtual hat designs. Finally, be on the lookout for the event scheduler later this week. There is only a few weeks to go till CiscoLive Digital starts.
CiscoLive is coming soon and I am working to get the inside scoop on what this all-digital event will be for the attendees. In my last post, I mentioned the contests that were coming – you can check that out here. Since then, the official CiscoLive announcement was published. You can read all about it here.
While you are there, notice that the virtual hat design contest is already looking for submissions. For anyone new to CiscoLive, the hat is a keepsake that you get when attending the Customer Appreciation Event. Of course, there is no in-person event this year so even the hat is going digital. But this year Cisco is looking to the attendees to design the hat. The winning design will be featured as add-on to pictures on social media platforms. Plus, the winner will get a nice prize. If you have any artistic kids out there, give them a shot at designing the hat. Just think how cool it would be for their design to be advertised globally by Cisco.
While contests are nice, they are not the main reason to attend the event. The team at Cisco is working hard to get some really good content. One thing we already know is how the event will be organized. The CiscoLive website shows us that there will be four channels: Possibilities, Innovation, IT Heroes, and IT Leadership. This means that there are only four stations available during the live event. While not all the details have been worked out, I can tell you that each channel will have some great speakers. For instance, we know that Susie Wee is a true innovator with what she is doing with the DevNet program – she would be a great speaker for the Innovation channel. IT Heroes will have the real technical people – could Tim Szigeti be handling one of the sessions in this channel? Of course, the IT Leadership channel will be designed for management. Chuck Robbins and his reports will be featured here. But it will not be just Cisco staff in these channels. The team is working hard to get special guest speakers and even some musical guests.
The event is still a few weeks away but more information is coming. Soon, Cisco will release the session catalog so everyone that registers will be able to pick their sessions. The catalog is more about knowing the content of the sessions as you will be able to channel surf. For instance, if you registered for an IT Heroes session but you find that it is not what you thought it would be, feel free to go to another channel like Possibilities. One thing to note though: only registered attendees will be able to channel surf so if you have not already done so head over to the site to register for the event. If you do not register, then you will only get to see the Innovation channel. The CiscoLive store is open and has some great merchandise. Cisco is stating that any merchandise ordered by May 20 will arrive in time to wear during the event.
It is time to start making preparations for the event. From what I have seen, there will be a lot of information available while watching the event. All this on-screen information means that a small screen may not be enough. If you can, use two monitors so you can watch the video on one while interacting on the other. Besides video content, there will be a chat feature for most of the channels as well access to other things like a virtual social media lounge where you will be able to see the top tweeters. To get on that list, just make sure to add #CiscoLive to your social media posts on your favorite social media sites. You may even get a prize for a great tweet. I am definitely looking forward to this event.
Posted inCisco, CiscoLive|TaggedCiscoLive|Comments Off on Another Inside Scoop on CiscoLive Digital
One of my favorite technical conferences is CiscoLive. Not only is it a great technical experience but it is a lot of fun. The different teams at Cisco really know how to put on a great in-person experience. Unfortunately, due to the global pandemic CiscoLive 2020 is going to be all digital. The experience is not going to be the same but that does not mean the people at Cisco are going to just phone (or Webex) it in. I have been working with some of the teams and have some insider information that I can share.
There are a lot of people working very hard to get the digital experience just right. The good news is that they are backed by a company that has people with technical knowledge. The show is going to be mainly a 2 day event on June 2-3, 2020. Head on over to the event site (www.CiscoLive.com) for more information. This is going to be an intensive watch session of videos and streams designed to have something for everyone.
For anyone that has attended CiscoLive before, you can expect the same type of content. Cisco is grouping their sessions into different channels: IT Heroes, Possibilities, IT Leadership, and Innovation. The IT Heroes Channel is all about technology and is the one to watch if you want those technical deep dives. The Possibilities Channel will include content from Cisco Executives and other IT technology leaders. The IT Leadership Channel is going to be about business acumen. Finally, the Innovation Channel is going to be about IT solutions and strategies that are essential to businesses. The actual content is being built so it is still in flux. I will try to get more information on the content.
Those 2 days are not all of it. Just like previous years, there will be on-demand videos posted later so you can watch content that you were not able to during the live event. Or re-watch those technical sessions because there will be some advanced concepts.
I did mention that I had some insider information. Being announced shortly are the contests. This will include social media contests for best business keynote insight and content for each day. This year, there is going to be a contest for best virtual hat with voting to be performed by the community. There will even be contests for best social conversations. There will be contests for blog posts. For all of the contests, make sure to use the new hashtag (#CiscoLive) so your tweets and posts can be seen. But will there be prizes? Most definitely and some pretty good ones ranging from Amazon Echo to Apple TVs to phone sanitizers. There may even be some passes to next year’s in-person event. But there one prize that is going to be the envy of all: a personalized CiscoLive bobblehead and a digital cape. There are only going to be a small number of those bobbleheads so get your social media fingers ready.
Get ready for the event on June 2-3 by heading over to event site (www.CiscoLive.com). This event is going to be free for everyone but you have to sign up. If you need some help with being a great remote attendee, you can check out my previous post. Finally, stay tuned for more insider information that I can pull out of the teams working on the event. They are busy making sure this will be an awesome remote experience.
Every year, a lot of technical companies host at least one large conference to showcase products and to help customers and vendors learn more about technologies. These are great events for numerous reasons including learning, seeing friends, and having a good time all in one week. Personally, I have gone to Cisco’s main conference, CiscoLive, numerous times. I think it is my favorite technical event of the year mainly because the CiscoLive team is really, really good at hosting the event. Between awesome technical discussions, unique experiences, and hanging with friends I do not get to see all year long, it is a really good time.
Unfortunately, in 2020 most of these events are not occurring the same way due to a global pandemic. Just like a lot of other conferences, CiscoLive is going digital for 2020. This does not mean it is going to be bad, just different. I have been helping the CiscoLive team with the event and I can tell you they have some tricks to make this event great. But there is nothing I can share at this time. One of the positives is that it will be free which means it will open up to people that were not able to attend previously. I expect it to be a really good event. I am guessing that, going forward, the CiscoLive team will be burdened with the extra work of a digital event on top of the physical events.
CiscoLive Best Remote Attendee
For numerous reasons I attended virtually for the last two years. I was even bestowed the title of “best remote attendee” during both of these years. Perhaps I know a thing or two about attending remotely. Here are some quick tips to help with being a good remote attendee, which is important this year since everyone will be remote attendees.
Social Media helps you attend. Head on over to Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, and even Facebook to interact with other virtual attendees. Use the event hashtag (#CiscoLive) to make sure others see your postings.
Cisco has its own Social Media team run by the awesome Kathleen Mudge, @KathleenMudge on Twitter. They monitor the main social media channels for comments about the event and will even respond to posts. It is really awesome to tweet out something and have one of the team respond to you.
Block your time. This one may be tough since you may still be at your office. Do what you can to carve out your time so you can concentrate on the event. Just like being there in person, you will get out of it what you put into it. Try to concentrate on the event.
Attend sessions that you want to know about right away. There will be more information available than you have time for but the on-demand library is your friend. You can come back later (after you digested what you just learned) and review what is in the on-demand library. Download slide decks, watch videos, take it all in later.
Have fun. Ok – it will not be as good as being there in-person. But that does not mean it will not be fun. Reach out to others and let them know your thoughts. Interact on social media when you can.
Now, I did mention that there is nothing I can share at this time but stay tuned and I will share some details as soon as I can. For now, use the event website (https://www.ciscolive.com/us.html?zid=cl-global) to get information before the event. You can even download a calendar reminder to help block your calendar (Tip #3 above). Check out the FAQs to help with your questions – the team will add good questions as they come in. If you do have questions that are not in the FAQ list, you can reach out to the CiscoLive team (@CiscoLive on most social media channels) or email support (ciscoliveus@ciscoevents.com) for anything technical. If you have any questions about attending remotely, you can reach out to me – I will help where I can.
It is the beginning of April 2020 and I have been working at home for a few weeks due to the global pandemic. Fortunately, I still have the Internet and some time to review the Network Field Day videos from February. One of the companies that I really wanted to review was Broadcom. This is because the topics were very interesting but complicated, in a good way.
Broadcom is a manufacturer of merchant silicon. Their customers are the vendors that make the equipment companies need to run their infrastructure including storage, optical, and networking components among other items. The company was formed over 50 years ago and has a heritage of AT&T/Bell Labs, Lucent, and Hewlett-Packard/Agilent, according to their website. Check out https://www.broadcom.com/company/about-us/company-history to see a history of the company over the years.
Broadcom Processors
While they have a much longer list of products, we only discussed their processors for networking equipment. This included the Tomahawk, Trident, and Jericho processors – see above for actual the actual processors. If those names seem familiar, it is because Broadcom processors are named from US missile names. Based on what we heard, I think it is very appropriate for them to use missile names as these processors are blazingly fast. For instance, their Tomahawk4 processor can power a switch up to 25.6Tbps. This allows a switch to offer up to 256 100Gb Ethernet or 64 400Gb Ethernet ports using a single processor.
So, why did I want to review the Broadcom video? It was not because I was not paying attention but rather that it was a complicated conversation. The presenter on the Tomahawk4 processer, Ian Cox, was awesome and really smart. He talked about how Broadcom builds the processors including the system board connections. It was really interesting but sometimes hard to follow. I recommend highly to watch these videos (and maybe watch them again) as I cannot do them justice.
Ian is a very smart guy and I was fortunate enough to have dinner with him the night before the presentation. We talked about his motorcycle adventures and his work experiences. At the time of the presentation, he was relatively new to Broadcom, working there since February of 2018. Considering the Tomahawk4 took about 2.5 years from start to initial product, he could not have been there the entire time but he was still one of the lead engineers on the project. Now, Ian worked at Broadcom previously from 2013 to 2017 – obviously, he was given a good offer to come back. If you watch one of his presentations, you will see why Broadcom hired him.
As I said previously, I cannot do justice to the Broadcom presentations. You need to watch them yourselves. One thing I can say is that they make some great processors. Network equipment designed around these processers will help any company to have better networks. That infrastructure is what we need these days to get our traffic to where it needs to go, quickly. Go watch the presentations and see for yourself.
Disclaimer: I was a delegate for Network Field Day 22. Gestalt IT (https://gestaltit.com/) paid for my airfare, hotel, and some of the food while I was there, including the dinner I mentioned. Neither Broadcom nor Ian Cox give or offer me any money to write this blog post. This post is completely from me.
One of the companies
that we visited for Network Field Day 22 (NFD22) was Riverbed. Fortunately,
Riverbed is not a new company for me as I have used some of their products in
the past. For NFD22, their SD-WAN solution was front and center. This is a product
that I have had experience with but it was back in 2018/2019. This made me
eager for my visit to learn the advances they have been doing.
Back in late 2018,
the company I was at decided to rollout Riverbed’s SD-WAN solution. At the
time, there were a lot of promises. This included having a cloud management
solution, the ability to accelerate application traffic, and the ability to
utilize Azure WAN to connect over global distances better. Unfortunately, our
experiences were not exactly what was promised. Their cloud management solution
did work well. They host the management platform and we were able to deploy
their appliances using templates built within the console. However, we
sometimes ran into minor issues when deploying appliances. To be honest, it was
not always the solutions fault but since Riverbed sold us the solution as easy
to use, I cannot really take all the blame when things failed. Regarding
application acceleration, some did feel faster but, at the time, we did not
have a lot of traffic going over the connections. Unfortunately, the sites we
used for testing were relatively new so we did not have a good comparison against
old connectivity (i.e. MPLS) at those sites. Once they were deployed, we had no
problems getting Riverbed appliances to build connections between each other.
Unfortunately, Azure WAN did not work as well. Based on my understanding of
what was happening, I would blame Microsoft for this failure, which was
primarily due to it being a new service. However, we were told by Riverbed that
it should not have any problems, which is not what happened at that time.
Now, my experience
with Riverbed was far from a failure. I would say they have a good product but
there were some issues when compared to what my company was sold. My personal
opinion is that Riverbed has good WAN solution but not a great one. Part of their
offering is to use best-of-breed solutions when it comes to concepts like web
security. For instance, if you are already using a product like Zscaler’s web
security then adding on the Riverbed SD-WAN would work really well. In this
case, switching to an all-encompassing solution would be more work.
Unfortunately for Riverbed, they are not the only ones doing this. Now, I am
not going to mention their competitors here but you should not have any
problems finding them.
I mentioned I was
eager to visit Riverbed. Since I did not have a great experience when my
company deployed it, I figured Riverbed had worked on these issues and would be
giving a presentation on how it works today. Unfortunately, that is not what
happened. Most of their presentation felt a lot like the sales pitch my company
was given back in late 2018. So, I have to assume that there is not much of a
change in the deployment issues. But if you are patient this should not be an
issue.
There was one item
that did get my attention. Vincent Berk (Chief Architect for Security at
Riverbed) gave a presentation that described visibility into the network
including when problems occur. This was something we did not have when we
deployed the solution and it looked like something that would have helped us.
Their NPM product (Network Performance Monitoring) gives the admin a visibility
into how the network, including the hardware components, is working and it does
this continuously. Check out the video linked below to hear more about it. This
makes me think that their development is making the products better.
I may not be the
only one with the same experience of the Riverbed WAN solution but my
experience should not mean to exclude them from your list of solutions. Their
solution offers a secure connection between sites which is the key factor for
SD-WAN connectivity. I cannot say if the Azure WAN connection works now since
my company never really got it to work while I was there and there was no real
mention of it during the presentations. Their management console was well
thought out. By adding on the NPM product, it looks to be an even better
solution. Riverbed definitely seems like a company that is forward thinking and
still coming up with new ideas and products. If you are already using web
security solutions like Zscaler, then a Riverbed SD-WAN should be on your list
of possible products.
I flew home yesterday from Silicon Valley. I just spent three days of intense learning from 10 different companies at Networking Field Day 22 (#NFD22). It went quickly even though there was a lot to sit through. I am still organizing my thoughts so I can write some posts on what I learned. In the meantime, here is a quick one on my time there.
The NFD22 Delegates (plus Tom Hollingsworth)
It started on
Tuesday flying out to SFO airport and then driving down to my home for a few
days in Santa Clara. After checking into my hotel room, my experience started.
The first night was about housekeeping. I met all the delegates over some good
food and drinks. That is when Tom Hollingsworth (@NetworkingNerd) started
things by giving us some details for the week. This included what to do (what
not to do) and what to expect. Additionally, we did our gift swap, which is
always a fun time especially with some of the awesome wrapping jobs – the My
Little Pony wrapping was a big hit.
The next day started
with two presentations at the hotel. The first was from DriveNets (https://drivenets.com) on their product for
service providers. While I do not work for a service provider, I can see how
their product could revolutionize networking by allowing service providers to
move to white box devices while still maintaining the high availability of monolithic
core switches. The second presentations was from Gluware (http://gluware.com/) about their intelligent
orchestration and automation system. Their product is something that seems
useful for an enterprise and they gave out a link to test drive it – I may have
more to write after I look into that.
After those two
presentations (and a quick lunch at the hotel), we headed over to Riverbed (http://www.riverbed.com/) to hear about
their take on SD-WAN including some network security (hooray for security). I
have had some experience with their SD-WAN solution so I may have more to write
on this presentation. The last presentation of the day was at CloudGenix (http://www.cloudgenix.com) with another
SD-WAN solution. Their presentation was very good and we discussed some really
interesting concepts they are working on. I think they have a hot product and I
am not just saying that because the room we were in was so small that the air
conditioning could not keep up (sitting next to the projector did not help).
After that, we went to dinner and then back to the hotel to get some sleep.
Our second day
started at Forward Networks (https://www.forwardnetworks.com/)
to hear about their network modeling and analysis toolsets. Their presentation
on a week in the life of a network engineer went over really well. The standout
to me was the “middle of the week” when the “engineer” has
to get to his kid’s recital and there is an intermittent problem with the web
site – it included dusting off the network binder including real dust.
After lunch, we
drove over to Arista to hear from them but first from one of their partners:
Kentik (http://www.kentik.com). Kentik is
another service provider orientated company so it is not something I would use
at my work but it is probably something I am already taking advantage of,
indirectly of course. What their product does it offer some good visibility
into Internet traffic. Our last presentation of the day was from Arista (http://www.arista.com/) on their networking
gear. We heard about their software methodology, which included why it is so
much better than another very large networking company that a lot more
companies use. It was easy to hear their passion on why they think they have a
better product. Of course, they are not the only network gear company.
The last day started at Broadcom (https://www.broadcom.com) on their processors. This was their first time at Networking Field Day and it was a wonderful topic. They sell to equipment manufacturers and I know I have had the benefit to use their processors. Seeing their Tomahawk 4 processor against a Cisco mini-UADP chip is unbelievable – just look below. Of course, it is an unfair comparison as they are used differently. I think the most interesting concept is that they build different processors because there are different styles of networks. This is one presentation that I still need to digest and re-watch because there was so much in it.
Cisco UADP 2 Mini versus Broadcom Tomahawk4
We then traveled to
Juniper (http://www.juniper.net/us/en/)
to hear about their network automation. Juniper is a networking company that
has been around for a while. I have made jokes about them in the past, mostly
about how they are still in business, but their presentation showed some really
good work using automation to make networking easier while still allowing
senior-level engineers the ability to dive into a CLI. After their
presentation, I can tell you they are still around for valid reasons.
Our last stop was at
VMWare (http://www.vmware.com/) to hear
about using their NSX product to secure containerized services like Kubernetes.
Last year, VMWare acquired AVI Networks and we heard how that integration has
been going. I think it was great that the presentation started with NSX
securing containerized services and ended with how the AVI load balancer
solution has been integrated into the same mix.
It was an intense
three days and I am so glad I had the opportunity to be involved. I am still
trying to mentally digest everything I heard. My plan is to go back over my
notes from each presentation so I can bring my experiences to you, the reader.
Of course, I will have to watch some of the recordings (especially the ones
from Broadcom) to help with that process. In the meantime, head on over to https://techfieldday.com/event/nfd22/
and scroll to the Presentation Calendar section for links to each company
including the videos. Let me know if you have any topics you want to hear more
about.
I have heard many times how bad social media is for society. The anonymity can allow people to put others down without repercussions or make wild claims that may not be true. But there are plenty of good things that social media has brought into our lives.
I am in my third
year of being a Cisco Champion. This is a group of people that Cisco has
identified as technical influencers. Cisco offers some really nice perks to the
group but one thing they do not control is the comradery within the group. I
feel like I have made all these friends that happen to be from all over the
world. There are plenty here in the United States but also from Europe, South
America, Middle East, and a few in Australia. Of course, Champions are all over
Social Media because that is what it means to be an influencer.
I have been using
Social Media for many years. I started using Social Media as an alternative way
to get news from around the world. It is a great way to find details from
people that I may not hear from on the evening news. I really enjoy seeing the
videos that people have made although I will admit that the videos where people
fail are fun to watch. But, my favorite use of Social Media is the ability to
communicate with others across the globe. I can hear the viewpoints from people
that live in other locations. It is really great to read the posts or see
videos from people that have different viewpoints which is partly because of
where they live. They have a different foods, different holidays, different
celebrations, even different governments. Getting these viewpoints is great
because it can open my mind up to what other people see and think.
The Champions are no
different as they are all over the world. I have gotten to meet some of them
but a good number are just too far away for me to visit. But I can see them
online and can have conversations across time zones. This is when Social Media
is really awesome. But it is not just about technical discussions. Some of them
are great cooks and seeing their creations gets me hungry. I was able to see
videos when some of them took to the skies, including one flying a plane for
the first time all by himself. Of course, the best are the Champion animals.
It’s great to see the pictures and videos of Athena, Aurora, Noodles, Bit, and
Byte – they know who they are.
Unfortunately, I
have not been able to make any major conferences since becoming a Cisco
Champion but I am planning to make CiscoLive this year. I am really looking
forward to meeting more of my friends in person and I have been told that at
least a couple are looking forward to meeting me. Social Media is great as it
allows me to stay in touch from far away but meeting people in person is even
better.
In the meantime, I
will continue to use Social Media to reach out to people all over the globe.
Social Media does have its bad parts as that is the way with a lot of
technologies. But it is how people use Social Media that can make it great. So,
just like I plan on continue doing, please use Social Media for the good that
it can give to this world. Feel free to reach out to me on Twitter using
@EvanMintzer – I love hearing the good stories and having conversations.
