Research, analysis, and thought leadership for enterprise communications.
Colin Berkshire
Colin Berkshire is a highly technical HR executive in the Pulp and Paper Industry. Colin has an engineering and voice background, and is currently on assignment in Asia.
Colin's RSS FeedTelecom in Your Inbox
Bell System Breakup Part 2
Part 1 Colin here. The Department of Justice (DOJ) anti-trust lawsuit had been running for a number of years, and by the early 1980s it was finally going to trial….
Read the article →
Bell System Breakup
Back in the 1970s I worked for the Bell System. That was a turbulent time in the company’s history because it was the introduction of competition. Here’s the real story…
Read the article →
The Origin of Email
Colin here, and I have a surprise for you. The inventor of email did not invent email. EMail was actually invented by the Bell System and was in commercial operation long…
Read the article →
Free Industry Downloads
This, that and some other type of call to action.
Opportunities
Colin here. We hear a lot in the news about the Chinese hurting US markets. It’s politically convenient to blame others for problems. The truth is that China represents the…
Read the article →
TSA: Truly Stupid A#**+#%s
Colin here. I had another set of luggage completely destroyed by the TSA. This is getting annoying and expensive. No, it wasn’t the airline, it was the TSA that ruined…
Read the article →
@DaveMichels
-
@DaveMichels: Still waiting for @TriciaLCooper to get married tonight. Maybe a few more table 1 cocktails will do it. #eworld13 - 3 hours ago
-
@DaveMichels: Will Opus replace 722 as the HD std for IP Telephony? - 7 hours ago
-
@DaveMichels: Why don't turret endpoints use binaural headsets instead of 2 handsets? #eworld13 - 7 hours ago
-
@DaveMichels: @TriciaLCooper I think @melanieturek was joking, it wasn't that compelling. :) - 7 hours ago
KimDotCom
Colin here. It’s very rare when an individual raises to the level that they are worth listening to. Steve Jobs was one of those people. Kim Dotcom may be another…I’m…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 8
“Epilogue” In this series I have been talking about how in the 1970s AT&T’s Billy Oliver had the vision to build a packet switched data network. Billy was the Steve…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 7
“The ACS System Has been Faked. It still does not work. It will never work.” At this point we have a situation where I reported that the ACS system cannot…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 6
“The fraud…” The Bell System ACS system was the largest privately financed R&D project in the history of mankind as of 1980. It was designed to have been the network…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 5
“Demonstrating the ACS system to the AT&T executives…and apparent success…” I have been discussing ACS, the Bell System version of the Internet. The BBN ARPANet was too small and couldn’t…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 4
“The Bell System Advanced Communications System Fails…” So, development progressed on the AT&T ACS system. This was the system destined to become what the internet is today. It was to…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 3
“The Bell System ACS system Takes Shape…and Fails…” This series discusses the largest private R&D development project in history as of the 1980s. It was a system called Advanced Communications…
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 2
“ARPANet and Scaleability” Today the ubiquitous Internet is taken for granted as being obvious and necessary. But in the 1970s things were different. There were a multitude of competing networks….
Read the article →
How the Bell System Missed the Internet 1
Colin here. One of the more fascinating twists and turns in corporate history is how the Bell System missed developing the internet. What follows is the story of ACS in…
Read the article →
Emerging LTE and the iPad
Colin here. I have been using the new iPad with Retina display for almost a year now. It’s great. But I have noticed an interesting problem: once you use Retina…
Read the article →
802.11ac is Almost Here
Colin here. 802.11ac will start appearing in force in products this year. It is the latest and greatest Wi-Fi standard that will replace 802.11a, b, and g. It will receive…
Read the article →
Growing Internationally
Colin here. One of the greatest opportunities any established business faces is growth internationally. Take a company like Apple. Recently, much has been made about how they have saturated the…
Read the article →
Is Security That Complicated
Colin here. I recently had to set up an account with a US Government web site. I had a dickens of a time picking a password. They had amazing rules:…
Read the article →
A High Temperature Mystery
Colin here. I just visited a data center of a branch in Thailand. I was headed down to Thailand anyway, and as they were having some problems and I like…
Read the article →
The Dreamliner and Telecom
A couple of months ago I wrote a series of critical articles on the brand new Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Yes, a bit off topic from Telecom, but a great lesson…
Read the article →