A Plan Comes Together

The past few days have been exciting for me in a variety of ways. One item that is very much public now is the launch of Pivotal.

A vision of consumer-grade enterprise apps running on carrier-class infrastructure managed by globally distributed devops poets = @gopivotal

— Jay Cuthrell (@Qthrul) April 18, 2013

If you had told me in 2010 that it would be 2013 when I got to see my Slide 17 and Slide 19 view of the world to collide then I would have probably been skeptical. My hope was to be looking 5 years out into the future.

Pull Requests Culture

If you have ever attempted to collaborate using documents, files, or other save and send approaches than you know how frustrating the world of Enterprise workplaces can be at times. Obviously, there is the notion of a corporate culture that might drive behaviours that lend to one person doing work while others chip in as permitted. What I mean is the tossing of a document back and forth without any semblance of revision tracking or use of available technology to promote a team effort and collective output.

But does it really have to be that way?

Perhaps you have seen the magic of simultaneous editing within Google Apps on a document or spreadsheet. Perhaps you recall the first time you saw Etherpad or the infamous Google Wave.

That’s just a document though. What about applications that are not unlike your first ICQ chat or seeing the other person doing something on the other end of iMessage on their iPhone or multiplatform chat app. It’s telegraphing the possibility of contribution. You are miles apart but working closely together in the moment.

But where do these modern applications live on the corporate desktop, laptop, and mobile endpoint?

Oh. That’s right. All the smart kids are working on pokes, virtual farming, and BitCoin for Path Stickers mashups with $1B valuations.

Wait. That’s not entirely true. In fact, I’d wager that there will be a huge number of consumer web kids that begin to find the world of revenue before the first billion users to be something worth their time and attention.

In which Paul Maritz gets the attention of every startup on the planet considering pivot to Enterprise #pte #p2e gigaom.com/2013/03/19/the…

— Jay Cuthrell (@Qthrul) March 19, 2013

Make It So

In order to realize the feature sets and enhancements that the past few years have seen in UX/UI, onboarding, social sharing, and teaming controls, etc. that pervade the consumer web world of startups – there has to be a different kind of company and a different kind of approach to leveraging the prior art and best practices. This will be how the Enterprise world gains access to and provides traction for the next wave of startups that haven’t been formed yet or that have not pivoted to Enterprise yet.

Consider that most of what runs in the legacy Enterprise IT world is decaying both in terms of new seats, alignment to consumer demand patterns, and generally complies to a paper to electronic improvement goal. Next, is the improvement of electronic to human factors goals. Now imagine those updates, fixes, enhancements, etc. done in a continuous and conspicuous manner through integration, interation, and deployment at the speed of whim based infrastructure.

Interview of @uservoice CEO @rrwhite soundcloud.com/scobleizer/the… Key point: ruthlessly and relentlessly remove annoyances and cognitive overhead

— Jay Cuthrell (@Qthrul) April 18, 2013

Ubiquitous Workload Substrate

To get to this vision – everything just has to work. All that infrastructure stuff below the platform as a service (PaaS) layer has to be completely and utterly BORING.

Now who on Earth might be thinking about that problem…

• the potential
• the possible
• the available 
• the ubiquitous

As I have done since 2010, I am once again looking forward to SxSW 2013 and what I will bring back to discuss with the team here at VCE. I’ve previously spoken at SxSW on topics ranging from changing attitudes to email to collaboration stacks to realtime network intercept concepts.

While I’m not speaking at SxSW this year, I will be soaking up sessions topics near and dear to my role here at VCE. My findings in prior years have been interesting when I look back on how things have turned out so far.

South by What?

Granted, if you are reading this blog post struggling to understand the role of SxSW or perhaps what SxSW is exactly, I’ll do my best to convey that. The way in which SxSW fits into the concerns of converged infrastructure might seem like a stretch, so please indulge me for just a moment…

Every March, tens of thousands of geeks, nerds, and creative people descend upon the Austin to soak in the latest trends and emerging technology for what is arguably the biggest event in technology on the planet. SxSW is broken up into three specific tracks: Interactive, Film, and Music. It is the SxSW Interactive sessions which are the most relevant to the ongoing transformation taking place in IT today. SxSW Interactive is also, by far, the largest and most dominant element of SxSW each year since I’ve been in attendance.

Over the years, I’ve noted that SxSW Film and Music also have sessions that focus on the technology side of those mediums. I always run into the application owners and stakeholders at various Enterprise companies, service providers, media and entertainment companies. Increasingly, these are the same people that are part of the unstoppable march of convergence.

SxSW Interactive has been the indexing arbiter of all the things that have become common elements of modern consumer web and increasingly Enterprise IT challenges and trends. In the past, SxSW revealed trends and directions relating to consumer web to geolocation to what has most recently been coined as big data.

SxSW Interactive is where the most bleeding edge attempts at viable (and not so viable!) business models emerge. This year at SxSW I’m expecting lots of big data, machine to machine, Internet of Things, and an increasingly Enterprise and devops oriented themes to emerge. As the saying goes – it’s not if but when.

Increasingly, there are references to a purely Enterprise and devops audience at SxSW Interactive. Agile and innovation spring up now as assumptions instead of a purposeful tagging for a given session or topic. Granted, this did not happen overnight but SxSW Interactive will be where I draw inspiration and cement an awareness of what is coming in the next few years.

In a nutshell, SxSW is where infrastructure professionals can get a rough idea of where the next great IT challenge is going originate. For example, past years proved the proliferation of personal mobile devices could not be ignored and the demand for whim based infrastructure was not fad.

Focus

SxSW Interactive 2013 will be the first time I will not be constantly updating my beloved geolococation, sharing, teaming, and collaboration apps of the moment. Those were fun. Having digested several failed and now successful brand names, their APIs, and expectations for use in a service provider and telecommunications context – it is time to shift focus.

This year at SxSW Interactive, I plan to draw new inspiration and focus on Enterprise and what has been adopted today and what is bring proposed in the near future. As always, there is an implicit impact to service providers for any hybridization in IT delivery and IT consumption patterns. This will ultimately translate into a disruptive technology buffet for Enterprise. It’s going to be a very exciting future indeed.

I expect a relentless assumption of infrastructure that is boring. I expect an even more relentless assumption that everything relating to getting developers productive on infrastructure is because it just works.

Why? It’s time.

First, the pace at which VCE has evolved is nothing short of amazing for the industry. Just consider how Vblock has helped transform the way in which VCE customers deliver IT.

Second, changing how companies can consume IT and what service providers will use to assist in that transformation is fundamental. VCE has been recognized as the market leader for this reason.

Delivering a new unit of IT was the first step. Allowing companies to realize ubiquitous workload substrate was the second step. Now it is time for the next step.

Directions

At SxSW in 2008, one of my favorite breakout sessions was a cloud computing meetup. While the topic was cloud computing the real discussion was how fast, repeatable, and viable it was to attempt consumption models behind the corporate firewall.

That’s right. The talk was taking place primarily because of developments and trends that made it permissible to stand up these new IT consumption and delivery architectures in an inherently controlled environment.

Some dubbed this private cloud. Others just kicked around the idea that mixing and matching private and public cloud resources were inevitable i.e. more blurring would occur. It was very apparent that virtual appliances with ready to use applications would be the norm regardless of being placed on premise converged infrastructure, hosted at a trusted service provider on converged infrastructure with an SLA, or in the public cloud with no SLA whatsoever.

Just a few months that same year later I noticed that almost all of the companies I tracked in the space of software, stacks, and other systems administration intensive apps offered Open Virtualization Format (OVF). By the end of 2008 OVF was the way all of the companies offering through their distribution mechanisms.

Now it is 2013. It’s time to see where IaaS, PaaS, SaaS, ITaaS, and other XaaS are heading. It’s time to see what ideas companies are kicking around and on what solutions they are doubling down in the coming years.

Trends

Most of the IT trends presented in prior SxSW Interactive years center on time to market, speed, and overall agility for companies. This year at SxSW a sampling of the Enterprise and IT specific topics range from apps ecosystems to gamification to identity to rapid deployment scenarios. In each topic the central themes often has a mix of opinions. On one hand, an implicit assumption is that only the future matters since legacy IT and legacy thinking is incapable of delivering next generation applications in a self service model. On the other hand, the slightly more pragmatic assumption is that all of the IT teams will demand greater speed and standardization to make that possible whether it is legacy or next generation.

The discussions at SxSW almost always center on the app developer point of view and the user point of view. When the role of operations and management comes up the assumption is that the IT team has to get on board now or at the very least satisfy these demands even if it means going outside their IT walls to do it.

End user computing and end user demand, it seems, waits for no one. As one colorful app developer put it in an equally colorful way:

Lead, Follow, or Get Out of the Way! (heavily abridged)

The velocity of VCE and our drive to unleash simplicity is in response to the convergence taking place at an ever quickening pace. These trends can best be summarized in the following YouTube videos.

The CIO and CTO of the future demand simplicity.

Executives want solutions.

The future of IT requires a break through.

DevOps demands intelligence, awareness, and integration.

This year will be the first one where I’m not expecting to see a lot of folks that I normally would and probably the first one where I’m clean shaven. Yeah. I’ll miss my SxSW regular pals and my signature goatee. That’s right. Bland mode.

Looking back

As I am tapping out this update into vi I am happy to say that my private repo on Github is working out great with my Octopress and tiny VM. Last year this time I was updating into a web browser, dealing with updating WordPress beta code, etc… This time around my world looks like this:

1

git add .; git commit -m 'yo dawg i heard you liked flat files'; git push origin master; rake generate

Looking forward

As I said, I’ll be clean shaven this time around. If you are looking for me just find the bald guy wearing the big VCE logo on the front and this on the back:

This will also be the first time at SxSW where I will not be checking into my beloved geoloco app of the moment. I plan to draw new inspiration this year and focus on Enterprise.

Oh. Did you nod off to sleep?

That’s right. I am going to be attending everything that has an Enterprise or an aligned to Enterprise theme.

Why?

It’s time. A lot has changed since 2010 and my past few years have been about putting a shoulder into changing how companies can consume IT. Delivering a new unit of IT was the first step. Allowing companies to realize ubiquitous workload substrate was the second step. Now it is time for the next step.

Looking up

A few days ago I was knee deep in VMware Partner Exchange aka VMware PEX. The big takeaway?

Biggest take away from #VMwarePEX: If you’re a VAR you must begin partnering with Service Providers or _become_ a Service Provider. #evolve

— Jay Cuthrell (@Qthrul) February 27, 2013

To say that there was buzz about VCE during VMware PEX does not accurately depict the vibe. It was electric. It was magic.

VCE is here to unleash simplicity. VCE Partners are going to make that possible. VCE Customers are going to reap the benefits of this evolution.

Looking at why

Having thousands of folks eager to learn more about your company is a good thing.

It was a huge week for VCE.

HUGE

I know that my writing here since joining VCE has been on the month to month schedule and that is in part because of the nature of what I am exposed to daily. It is a treat when I can share it. It is also important to share at the right time and in context.

Hello World

— VCE Vision (@vcevision) February 21, 2013

VCE has a plan. VCE Partners are instrumental to the plan. VCE Customers benefit from this plan.

Just take a look at these YouTube videos and it is easy to see why.

Executives want simplicity. Period.

Vblock is a reference architecture killer. Period.

John Chambers, Joe Tucci and Pat Gelsinger are on board. Period.

The future of IT requires a break through. Period.

VCE Vision Intelligent Operations Software is the future. Period.

SAP HANA is about when not if. Period.

Vblock System 200 transforms mid-sized data centers. Period.

Vblock System 100 transforms distributed IT operations. Period.

VCE is committed. VCE Partners are excited. VCE Customers are delighted.

One of my favorite YouTube videos became a new source of inspiration for me. The lyrics and visuals are decidedly old school. As such, it can be fun to mix things up and think of how they can apply to recent events.

Flip it

Converged infrastructure, fabric based infrastructure, integrated infrastructure systems, and probably a few other phrases can be used to describe what I’ve been calling ubiquitous workload substrate for a few years now. So when I first found out that VCE was named by Gartner as the market share leader for integrated infrastructure systems, I knew it was only a matter of time before things got even faster and crazier than they were before.

Things have always moved fast at VCE. The overall IT industry in both enterprise and service provider settings is being pulled from the past to the present. VCE is focused on pulling this industry into the future. VCE isn’t sitting still. VCE is all about riding the rocket while constructing and reworking that same rocket in real time.

It’s probably no shock that VCE competitors would almost immediately launch into some kind of marketing conniption when VCE was named as a leader by a third party in this way. Yet, I’m still amazed that so many other companies claim to do the same thing as VCE and fall so short of the target VCE has created.

Still, it can be less clear who the leader is when the market is being filled with overly broad use of terms or when a category is highly diluted through purposefully ignorant press coverage. This drive by phone it in approach to writing happens when various consumer web blog empires stray to the coverage of enterprise and infrastructure.

Say, for example, a so-called tech journalist that covers the automobile industry trying to compare factory built automobiles to kit cars, bicycles, and skateboards – because both have wheels. Better yet, someone that sells skateboards becomes a trusted source for an audience that covers the market for automobile.

Setting aside the desire to simply make wild claims, there is always an audience that will take the path of lazy or stupid and hit the publish button. The good news is that there are times when smart coverage makes the stupid coverage look, well, even more stupid.

Now it’s a daily word

There is a moment where a clear leader is easily identified in a market. When that leader emerges the moment can be short lived or the preview to market dominance in an ever increasing competitive landscape.

Fact: VCE has been named the market share leader for integrated infrastructure systems by Gartner. This is not up for debate. (you know… a fact!)

Opinion: Every other VCE competitor that is chasing after the same market will have to match pace and come at VCE on every front of the the Vblock™ System Support Experience and overall customer experience. Full stop. They have to. Otherwise, these VCE competitors are basically conceding one or more areas of the experience that VCE is superior.

Being the leader in a market is also a curious state of being defined or categorized at a moment in time. Being known for leading something is not without peril. Words matter when there is a specific and unique occurrence that is being described for the first time and at the time of taking a leadership position. This is especially true in markets that are growing.

Seems you’re stuck

For example, I can recall working for companies in the past that claimed to own a specific market back in the late 1990s. It would go a little like this:

• Company A realizes apples to apples comparison metrics put Company B in the leader position.
• Company A then changes definitions and creates a new statistic that makes the numbers look more impressive.
• The statistic, of course, meant absolutely nothing but now Company A is the leader.

Pretty slick right? Wrong. The fallout comes later but looks something like this:

• Company A customers didn’t know they were part of the statistic.
• Company A customers saw through it.
• Company B calls out Company A – typically in public forums, etc…
• Company A backs away from using the statistic in future marketing.
• Analysts covering Company A are even more merciless in hounding around those flubbed statistics when year over year growth doesn’t match future reporting of the numbers.

Looking back, that market no longer exists today and many of those companies no longer exist as well. You have to have a direction and preside over your own destruction. It turns out you can go pretty fast in an automobile by putting it in neutral, rolling it down a hill, and eventually over a cliff. This would also apply to a skateboard. Hmmmm…

Hurry hurry step right up

Now that I’m on the West coast I’m looking forward to the new offices in Silicon Valley being a touch down for customer meetings. Being witness to phenomenal growth and continuous integration in our products and delivery capabilities has been delightful.

There is often a horse race mentality or a zero sum game point of view when regarding markets. The less myopic view is to also consider the overall size of a market and the consideration of that market as being in expansion versus contraction.

Here’s to the future.

Can you name this tune?

Speaking of the future… and in the spirit of adding another YouTube video to this post… It was a blast being part of the VCE team supporting one of our investors, EMC, and their amazing professionally trained dance troupe, the EMC Giddyups in this helpful instructional video. ;-)

Rumors of my transition into a song and dance career are greatly exaggerated. You know, they say the camera adds 15 pounds… or in my case… 95 pounds or so!

I’ve been in San Francisco for a few months now. The actual number of days that I’ve been in San Francisco is much less due to travel, work, family, and good old fashioned vacation time spent in Montana. The fact that I can be in Montana in a few hours using Delta, United, or even Allegiant is pretty smooth even if there are blackout dates to work around.

While in San Francisco, I’ve been able to visit EMC and Cisco offices in downtown San Francisco by walking. That’s what I like to call awesome. I’ll eventually get around to the other satellite offices in walking distance. Did I mention how awesome that is? I don’t miss my car and I really don’t miss trying to find a parking spot.

I’ve just learned about a Cisco shuttle from San Francisco to Cisco campus that sounds like the Google shuttle. I’ll report back once I’ve got a handle on the ins and outs of that process. The timing and door to door aspect has appeal when I can’t afford to miss a morning meeting in Silicon Valley.

Caltrain trips to Silicon Valley have been on time, uneventful, and delightfully peaceful so far. It’s not too bad if you are going to Palo Alto but there are still some gaps when you want to get to a meeting at EMC. Cisco is no problem. Light rail options and buses fill in the gaps. The best part about riding Caltrain from San Francisco is that the Creamery is right across the street. Hello pecan pie.

BART is still as good as it gets for to and from OAK and SFO. The fact that I can map out a route if I have luggage (rare) is nice. Technically, I could even BART an East Bay route to get to Cisco and EMC with those same gaps filled by light rail and buses. I hope to experiment more in the coming months as I am able.

MUNI buses have been good in that they are two bucks. That said, my one trip to Tenderloin on a MUNI bus so far was delayed because someone experienced a theft then refused to let the bus driver continue until the bus driver called the police. I learned that walking can sometimes be faster than riding. Also, I was reminded that theft can happen just about anywhere in the big city.

If I get in a pinch there is always TaxiMagic, Flywheel, and Uber. While I’ve heard good things about Lyft and other ride sharing services, I’m just not as socially graphed enough for that yet.

Speaking of social graphs… My return to Facebook is mostly done. I expect being on Facebook again will assist with some of that social graph mapping. That said, I’m still treating Facebook as a place where it’s all out there and any notion of privacy or vagaries around information being protected is fantasy at best. As the saying goes… if the product is free… you’re the product. Still, value is relative and single sign on has some advantages for the lazy aspects of my dialog with here today gone tomorrow services.

The sheer number of restaurants, bars, and related consumption options is impressive as expected by being in a city proper. So far I’ve been using Path, Foursquare Lists (really really good), and Facebook — in that order. Yelp is useless to me because the recommendations seem like a search through complaints more than kudos. Maybe that will change. Maybe not.

I’ve not used Postmates yet but I have an idea of where I might use it.

I’m quickly realizing AT&T is spotty for calls and especially so with 3G data. My move to Verizon is in process.

Lastly, the new look here on the blog is thanks to a migration from WordPress to OctoPress. I even found drafts I had not published for some reason. Cleanup continues. I even enabled Disqus again.

VCE is all about riding the rocket while constructing and reworking that same rocket in real time. – VCE 101

Having just returned from trips to Barcelona and Saudi Arabia I can see 2012 has shaped up to be one of those so-called travel intensive years. I’ve experienced travel at this level before but not as international. That means a bit more time to reflect on flights that aren’t wifi enabled and watching more inflight movies than I can recall before grabbing extended naps.

When I look back on the first meetings with VCE folks in 2010 the topic of how much travel was too much travel came up immediately. At the time I was clear that in my consulting practice it was easier to count the days I was not traveling. Everyone smiled and said that it wouldn’t be anywhere near that much travel.

Back then I knew there would be demand for what VCE was doing and what it was planning on doing. What I didn’t know was that I’d be heading west in just over two years

This is what I do. I get around.

Every single trip has been this year has been to take meetings with customers – multiple customers and multiple meetings per day in most cases. VCE customers that have realized the benefits of Vblock Systems are an ever growing global list.

The travel is pretty concentrated in terms of what is accomplished on each trip. There is the ground you cover in the room and the ground you cover beyond the room. It’s not uncommon that when I get to the meeting there is already a conference bridge, a WebEx, or a Cisco TelePresence session pulling together global rosters of VCE, Cisco, EMC, VMware, and customer teams.

There is no off switch. We are all online.

If you blink you might miss something. It’s true. Looking through my various sharing channels I’m reminded of just how much information courses through our veins. Luckily there is a solid and growing team of really smart folks here. So I can’t help but smile when I see a reply, wiki edit, or sharing of something better than I was going to send. You can sense the Americas, EMEA, and APJC nature of it all like some kind of indexed histogram of intelligent and often quite humorous banter.

The M&A show continues. Any questions?

This year has seen a lot of M&A activity from VCE investors. Each time Cisco, EMC, or VMware makes a move there is undoubtedly going to be speculation online in hopes of generating page views or promoting some kind of horse race narrative. This is to be expected and it often requires I be ready to explain for the hundredth time what VCE is about and where VCE is going to the uninitiated, the curious, the contrarian, and sometimes… the curmudgeon.

For example, when Cisco acquired Cloupia there was bound to be questions such as

“Does this mean Cisco IAC is going away?”

“Does this mean Cisco customers will use Cisco IAC or Cisco Cloupia?”

“Where did I put my glasses this morning?”

The simple answer to the going away question is “no” but color is required to illustrate that not everything in the market is a horse race or binary system of 1’s and 0’s. As such, in the wider DCIM landscape ‘it depends’ is that most pesky of responses that requires education and presenting the background to capture goals, coverage areas, concerns, and any caveats.

Cisco IAC is data center oriented to encompass “a range of implementations” involving converged infrastructure, bare metal OS, VMs, network endpoints, apps, etc. To contrast, Cisco Cloupia is razor focused on specific requirements ranging from converged infrastructure products like Vblock to reference architectures like VSPEX and FlexPod.

Considering both Cisco IAC and Cisco Cloupia are API rich it’s also a good bet that you’ll see some of both (mixed and matched) as specific converged infrastructure operations and automation needs emerge and grow within enterprise and specific service provider environments.

Of course, that’s just a Cisco example. I fully expect that M&A will continue at a robust pace from all VCE investor angles and interests.

In each instance VCE will highlight how we’ve been thinking about the future as it applies to each of our investor innovations be they organic, M&A, collaborative, and ultimately interlocked.

As always, we can only do our best at VCE to present a sane and logical statement… that raises discourse to… promote a… uh…

Seriously?

Oh the places you’ll see

On Monday last week I gave the final in a series of five keynote talks on innovation for NTCA that took place all across the US. I drove across Minnesota to get from MSP to Brainerd and Gull Lake. The colors were popping. The crowd when I arrived to present was receptive and warm. Looking back on this keynote series it was truly an honor to be selected by NTCA and to have a platform to share my views on innovation and a bit about VCE.

As soon as I left the stage there were a series of conversations taking place back at VCE on what and where I wanted to be next. The next series of conversations were about what country I’d be in next and when to support the next phase of growth at VCE. As I caught my flight to San Jose my mind was already made up but I still needed the details.

On Tuesday the blur of work calls, WebEx, and research eased into the late afternoon. To relax, I attend a seminar in Silicon Valley powered by pizza and Diet Coke as speakers from Netflix, Google, and enStratus shared unique perspectives on a variety of domains from foundations to failures to the fantastical. By now emails were flying around relating to the details so that moved final discussions to mid-week.

On Wednesday I worked out of the Cisco office in San Francisco. I was able to book my final travel details for trips to Spain and Saudi Arabia. By this point the trip to Germany was already starting to look like it could be handled locally. I was also rounding up contacts for other OCTO team members heading to APJC. In between I was able to walk around a disarmingly sunny San Francisco to find pecan pie. There’s just something about pecan pie that helps you think clearly. Well, that’s what I tell myself at least. That evening I shared my decision with VCE.

I’m moving to San Francisco.

On Thursday I found a place to live. That morning I put down a deposit, filled out paperwork, and gave my contact information to confirm it all on Friday.

Seriously. You can do that in San Francisco. I used this amazing new service called Craigslist. You should check it out if you get a chance. They just might be a big deal one of these days.

That Thursday night I flew on Virgin to Las Vegas for my speaking session on maximizing virtualization at Cloud Services Summit during TelcoTV.

On Friday morning I got confirmation that I could pick up keys when I get back to San Francisco. When I arrived at the event I managed to catch the end of the ATIS Reference Architecture overview and attend their Q&A.

After I took the stage, my presentation veered quickly to the topic of software defined data centers. To get there I started with a light overview of what software defined networking is part of that puzzle. There were several heads nodding in agreement in the room.

After my presentation I realized that the speaker after me was going to devote his entire presentation time to software defined networking. I love it when things work out like that!

That Friday night I took the redeye back to RDU on Southwest as the orange painted sky to my back illuminated the desert below. I took a short nap and I woke up to the sparse lights of North Carolina under low clouds. When I looked at the time I made the decision that going to Moogfest would not be half as fun as visiting Beaufort. Maybe next year, Moogest.

The big questions

So what’s the best part of moving to San Francisco? It’s a lot closer to Montana. Hah! I bet you thought I was going to say something about bacon. Nope!

So what’s the roughest part of moving to San Francisco? If you were to ask me that as I was making the decision it would be the distance from Beaufort.

Then again, there are these wonderful inventions called airplanes and this concept called vacation that I’ve been reading more about lately. Perhaps it won’t be that rough after all.

You are witnessing the transformation of an entire industry. _ Pay attention. It will be faster than you think._ – VCE Deal Desk Mission Control Room

Two years ago this week was my first day at VCE. The past year at VCE started off with a review of my first year at VCE. To keep things consistent I’ll follow a similar format for this anniversary post.

I’m posting this one a bit ahead of time because I’ll be soaking up knowledge at OpenStack Summit 2012 in San Diego.

So much for that plan.

Grow and go

My role has shifted more than a few times within VCE. Those shifts were ones I could see happening as VCE grew and I went into my second year knowing travel might be a bit more intense. Sure enough, my travel has been wide and often but this year really stepped up on the international front.

Looking back on the past 12 months I’ve traveled all over the US to meet with customers. In addition, I’ve visited Australia, the United Kingdom, Japan, Singapore, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, and Germany is right around the corner. Before 2012 is over I’ll likely visit even more countries where customers have realized the benefits of Vblock Systems.

While the travel have been exciting for me, seeing the success of VCE in terms of our customers, partners, and investors has been incredibly rewarding. Knowing folks that have been with VCE going back to Acadia and pre-Acadia days gives me a new sense of respect for their strength of will and their ability to see to this rocket ship soar. Each time I have a chance to meet new hires it reminds me where I started in this mix and I’m right back at a small meeting in Boston getting fitted for my new space suit.

Last month I spent a day at the VCE office in RTP. The building was familiar to me when I visited it the first time a few months ago. One of the things that really stood out was the pair programming / extreme programming rooms. Those are going to be popular. I’m also delighted at the amount of meeting space and all the touch down spots for folks like me. It’s been several years since I had an office with a door and I don’t miss it.

Last week I was in San Francisco again. Previously I had pondered why I’m not out there permanently. A few folks brought clarity via the Twitters and for that I am thankful. The wisdom of relocating for the sake of a larger airport is still interesting. In fact, I’m still working on living in five major cities in five years. It’s fun to have a side research project.

Harder than you think

Just to segue for a moment… this is my blog. Mine. I’ve talked about VCE a bit here over the past two years.

During this time, the outside coverage of what VCE is and what VCE does has also been on the rise. I wish I could say it was all positive and supportive of the mission of VCE – or at the very least, objective. I say I wish because I’ve learned a lot along the way.

On the getting better each day front I think of the tech analysts. You see, the investment group analysts that I supported years ago are different from the tech analysts that are part of the subscription content world in that investment analysts are razor focused on financial impacts whereas tech analysts take a much wider view of indicators that (may) lead to financial impacts.

Tech analysts typically have some variety of pulpit for publication and dissemination of their points of view and that might include a blog of sorts. Good tech analysts have a track record, lineage, and are well known.

Very often the tech analysts have a serious background in technology or made the jump from technologist to analyst and with it an easily identified perspective and a track record you can query. As such, I’ve really enjoyed getting to know this group so that I might better understand their motivations, needs, and tendencies.

To be clear, these tech analysts are not to be confused with so-called tech bloggers.

So what do I mean by tech bloggers? Simple. Tech bloggers are folks tend to appear from nowhere and while they cover tech topics… the world of productized converged infrastructure is pretty specific.

That means you have to be careful with tech bloggers. Why? Because the tech bloggers can really get things twisted if you are not extremely careful and deliberate in your message. Then again, even if you are extremely careful and deliberate in your message some of the tech bloggers… will still get it twisted.

When it comes to tech bloggers, there are probably some analogies to swimming that can be made. Some tech bloggers are gold medal winners that dazzle us with their insights and long form analysis that might make you wonder if they aren’t destined to become tech analysts one day.

Others… yeah, not so much. You see, some tech bloggers swim in an ocean knowing full well they didn’t even have their badge for the deep end of the kiddie pool. Many of these same tech bloggers will have a limited horse race, hyperbolic, zero sum, or war motif vocabulary that they invariably use to bury the lead like the dead fish it represents in terms of thoughtful consideration, deliberation, and analysis.

To put a fine point on it, it is the kind of tech bloggers that are always fixated on some kind of death watch. They won’t get it and it might be fair to say they don’t want to get it.

With each year VCE has thrived it has become some kind of personal affront to these kinds of tech bloggers. For these reasons, the single most annoying thing I read these days is the occasional misinformed, poorly sourced, and outright lazy phone it in contrarian coverage when it comes to all things VCE as seen through the fog glazed spectacles of tech blogger wearing bright orange inflatable arm bands.

If there were a handful of things I wish these tech bloggers and their editors would finally grasp it would fit into a short and sweet list:

1. VCE is a successful company in every metric that matters and our customers, partners, and investors know this to be true.

2. VCE customers are realizing the benefits of Vblock Systems over and over again.

3. VCE partners are committed to succeed with Vblock Systems to provide delightful and repeatable converged infrastructure experiences for customers.

4. VCE investors are committed to our success.

I know. Crazy right? :-)

However, while that 40 job postings number seems impressive, if you head over to the careers section of the VCE website and see over 140 job postings. That’s almost 12% planned growth. It’s a good time to find your inner unicorn jockey!

It’s fair to say that VCE’s growth is impressive across a variety of metrics. Furthermore, the base pairs that built up VCE to this stage is worth considering – there is heritage aplenty but there is also a hunger and passion for what is next.

With what’s next in mind, here are some of the VCE job postings you’ll find on Linkedin:

• Technology Consultant - CTO Office

• vPlatform Support Engineer Dallas

• Director of IT Governanace

• Principal Market Strategist

• Java Software Engineers (multiple)

• Business Operations Analyst

• vPlatform Support Engineer Dallas

• Director of Sales Operations

• Sr vArchitect - Dallas (SI/SP)

• Jr. vArchitect

• Senior Administrative Assistant

• Sr. vArchitect - NYC

For a full listing of global VCE job posting head over to http://vce.com/careers/ aka unicornjockey.com

In fact, much like the continuous integration approach to converged infrastructure we take at VCE – my answers are getting better. Then again, I’ve been accused of explaining how to build a clock when asked what time it is.

So here are three of the regular questions I get and here are the respective answers that I draw upon depending on the audience and their proclivity for staying awake. ;-)

What should the industry know about VCE that it might not know already?

First and foremost, VCE is a tremendous success for our investors and is experiencing explosive growth in terms of customers, partners, and the talent pool we’ve attracted.

To understand this success is to understand why VCE exists. VCE seeks to eliminate challenges that consume today’s data center resources by delivering the world’s best VMware experience on the world’s most advanced converged infrastructure product: Vblock Systems. VCE defined the converged infrastructure movement and is extending its lead just as other vendors that compete with our investors initiate efforts in this market. VCE customers depend upon VCE to efficiently run agile data centers that provide a competitive advantage along with VCE investor and VCE Partner technologies and solutions.

What value is VCE providing to Service Providers today and what is VCE’s ongoing strategy?

VCE Vblock Systems provide secure and predictable performance through pre-engineered, modular infrastructure that enables standardized processes and operations that make it permissible for a Service Provider (SP) to standardize on a converged infrastructure product that is adaptable and proportional to their own customer requirements.

Vblock represents a product driven by the demand to have a trust and SLA as guiding principles so that the SP can achieve the fastest time to market while maintaining customer expectations with predictable and quickly repeatable scaling patterns. VCE is focused on SP solutions that address not only the unique internal IT requirements of the SP but also the consistent demand for revenue generating offerings and the infrastructure that supports those offerings. VCE is committed to promoting ever increasingly agile delivery with the SP environment by supporting the next generation of use cases and scenarios that Enterprise IT will demand in the coming years. VCE will accomplish this through continued innovation and refinement of our own VCE developed IP in addition to the judicious use and application of technology innovations from our investors and partners.

What is VCE’s position and opinion on reference architecture within SP environments and more generally in the market today?

VCE believes that there are three paths to converged infrastructure.

First, there is a BYO piece parts approach where a customer can literally pick and choose each element that comprise a point in time converged infrastructure or create an amalgam of technologies that they can stitch together on their data center floor. For best of breed in these component choices there are obvious benefits to using EMC and Cisco for storage, compute, and network needs for VMware environments. The customer then tunes and refines this on their own or with the help of trusted partner as an iterative process doing their own regression testing across patches, move/add/change, and compliance both physically and logically.

Second, there is the reference architecture approach such as EMC VSPEX where a more refined list of those elements are brought together with guidance from a major product supplier for a scenario or scaling pattern that worked at least once for one variety of workload or use case scenario. This reference architecture can then be extrapolated or interpolated so that a sized anticipated workload can reside on the assembled parts. The physical parts are then delivered by a channel and paired with professional services that provide for an on site logical build followed by ongoing contracted services or customer created regression testing across patches, move/add/change, and compliance both physically and logically.

Third, and I should add that VCE has very strong opinions here, is Vblock. Vblock is a manufactured converged infrastructure product paired with ongoing pre-engineering and ongoing support from VCE as it applies to the lifecyle of the investment. It is also important to understand the mission criticial workload characterizations as well as mixed workload characterizations that VCE applies to Vblock with a focus on solutions. Vblock represents the fastest return on invested capital for the Enterprise IT buyer seeking a converged infrastructure. For the SP, Vblock represents a just-in-time approach to entertaining and winning deals while maintaining SLA with unparalleled investment protection and product efficacy though the Vblock product lifecycle. Long term, VCE sees Vblock as the future and VCE customers are realizing this future today.

In fact, you can see and hear a similar complimentary point of view shared by Cisco’s Senior Director Shashi Kiran and EMC’s VP Partner Solutions Parmeet Chaddha as well as a summary by me at the end on YouTube.

This post first appeared on the EMC Community Network

Kicking off the week at VMworld included a panel for service providers (SPs). I was fortunate enough to represent VCE on the panel. The discussion when shifted to the concerns of the SP provided for some of the more memorable moments for me. In part, the SP points of view between EMC, Cisco, VMware, and VCE represent unique positions but also provide for the very interlock that VCE presents in the form of Vblock Systems.

One of the take aways is that for the SP there has to be an acknowledgement of the mix of those that are facilities based providers with wireline and wireless assets as well as those that are focused on the next generation data center. Said another way, the SP is a segment that can be contrasted with Enterprise. This also means that just as there is wondrous variation in the needs of the Enterprise there can be a strong case made for the unique needs of SPs.

The questions on the panel were polite and the ensuing dialog refreshingly devoid of drama – as if we all might be working together on solving real problems and providing real solutions. To contrast, much of what passes for ‘tech blog’ coverage these days is on par with tabloids. All apologies to legitimate tabloids. ;-)

Sometimes I felt like I was providing a summarization or pile on to the concepts eloquently provided by EMC, Cisco, and VMware. I did resist to use the word “ditto”. That said, my ability to cover certain topics was limited due to the timing of the dinner being on Sunday. cough Embargo! cough

Indeed, during subsequent meetings with customers after the dinner it was apparent that the messages and updates shared by VCE are on target. One might argue this is to be expected when you have the comfort and trust of sharing deeply technical information and providing a window into futures. Others might argue that there is a selection bias or other artificial weighting of discussion in the given sample. I’d simply argue that this has been the ongoing refinement of what VCE is and where Vblock fits into the conversation with the individuals and companies that will shape the next era of computing. For me, these customer meetings continue to be the gift that keeps on giving.

Speaking of gifts… as you might recall from my disclosure policy it is not possible for me to accept gifts that are of significant value. During my panel for the SP audience I was provided with a swag gift bag that apparently contained this:

Here’s the deal: I want to give YOU this brand new Apple TV.

Rules: Just write up a blog post of your own detailing what you think of as being the future of converged infrastructure. Tweet your blog post and add a /cc @qthrul to the end of your tweet.

UPDATE: Entries so far:

I’ll check back when I’m back from vacation on September 10. I’ll pick the best article and then we can arrange shipping details. Sorry international folks – this has to be limited to the US and Canda.

[1] this video outtake from a group of my peers gave me a huge laugh (semi-NSFW) and it highlights the amazing group camaraderie exhibited this week – huge props to Cisco’s Dominick Delfino (@domdelfino), VCE’s Jeramiah Dooley (@jdooley_clt) and EMC’s Chad Sakac (@sakacc) for really putting the button on this one.

My original question which oddly enough did not fit into the Branch textarea was “Does a beta invite methodology like that of @Branch help or hinder perceived relevance?”

Then I noticed how the Twitter cards for Branch already works…

Because… again, that’s an exclusive club for Twitter developers or content creators or some such nonsense.

Then I noticed I could liberate my Branch to my own CMS via… a javascript badge.

Does a beta invite like @Branch help or hinder relevance?

At this point I’ve sprayed Twitter (via DM apparently) and others with public @replies so naturally I elected to add the arbiter of value and direction in such things.

So, perhaps the appropriate image is indeed appropriate

More thoughts as they come to me…

SxSW 2013 will be my sixth SxSW in a row. I’ve spoken at SxSW three times as well. This time around I’ve entered three panels for SxSW 2013 and already put down cash for my Platinum badge. Yep, I’m going to do it big time again for SxSW 2013 – Interactive, Film, and Music.

So what are the three panels about?

The first is aimed at the Interactive portion of SxSW. Considering there are over 76 panel submissions this year that reference cloud… we’ve officially arrived. The second panel is hopefully going to include the geniuses at EMC that pulled off a series of entertaining videos for various events.  The third is an overview of Vblock within the Cisco Production Media Data Center (PMDC) design.

Below I’ve put in the overviews, the questions I want to answer for my audiences, as well as direct links to the voting for these panels. If you are planning to attend SxSW and feel strongly enough to vote – just click the thumbs up on the left hand side of the SxSW PanelPicker. Thanks!

[

A Cloud Drinking Game: Buzzwords to Billions

](http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/464) It’s a war chest fueled party and the big wallets are paying for all the drinks.

Will you indulge?

Internet juggernauts are tapping their war chests vying for the remains of what we are all simultaneously creating and creatively destroying. Enterprise IT shops are faced with demands to move at consumer web speed. We all just want this stuff to work. Let’s examine how the consumer web startup of today can find themselves in strange exciting new markets behind the corporate firewall.

1. Who are the top Internet juggernaut M&A teams?

2. What characteristics make startup products permissible for Enterprise IT buyers?

3. Where does the startup product need to live to be viable?

4. When does the Enterprise IT shop of tomorrow go shopping?

5. Why does more Yammer + Microsoft type M&A activity make sense?

[

Cloud Freaky: Corporate Creativity Culture

](http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/481) What could be more dry a topic to cover than knowing your product appeals to folks that rarely see sunlight. That’s right. The exciting world of infrastructure! But that’s okay. You can get past the awkward moments and let your freak flag fly. Here’s an examination of how niche infrastructure oriented companies are breaking the mold and getting their message across – and tickle funny bones.

1. Who do I need to get buy in to be successful?

2. What is fair use and likely to not end your career?

3. Where do you find the talent and time for these projects?

4. When do you know you missed the mark and when you hit the bullseye?

5. Why is this better than the generally accepted way of doing marcom?

[

BACK OFF: My other media data center is a Vblock!

](http://panelpicker.sxsw.com/vote/478) What would it be like to have everything you need fit into a single rack? In a truck? It’s here today. Let’s talk about how an entire production media data center (PMDC) can fit into what once took up the whole truck into a single rack. What about taking it all to the next level of capture, cut, circulate, to CDN.

1. What are the primary technology changes that enable PMDC?

2. Who realizes the benefits of PMDC today?

3. Where will PMDC designs evolve over the next year?

4. When will the PMDC be as standard as content tools for acquisition?

5. How can you get more involved in the PMDC revolution?

For a limited time you can be part of history by incrementing database rows for OpenStack Foundation Board nominations openstack.org/members/checkN…

— Jay Cuthrell (@Qthrul) August 6, 2012

Last week I received the minimum 10 nominations (including my own self-nomination) from Individual Members of the OpenStack Foundation to be considered as a candidate for the 2012 Individual Director elections for the OpenStack Board of Directors. Voting takes place over the course of 5 days August 20, 2012 to August 24, 2012.

Now, before folks start having a whinge and decide this is all a popularity contest let me state that it is not. If it was, Robert Scoble would be in the list. So, now that we have that out of the way, I would like to provide my responses for what will hopefully appear shortly on the OpenStack Foundation Board - 2012 Election Candidates website.

Below are the standard question list responses I’ve provided back to Jonathan Bryce. Jonathan is someone who I don’t think I have talked to since Interop for Rackspace’s King of the Apps judging at House of Blues last year.

Here’t the thing… I’m not unique from anyone else in the industry in that I know a lot of Rackers and other folks involved in the OpenStack community. In my case this even goes back to folks that know me from my college days… that assure me I’ll never hold public office. I digress… ;-)

Okay – my responses: Enjoy!

1) What is your relationship to OpenStack, and why is its success important to you and/or your company? What would you say is your biggest contribution to OpenStack’s success to date?

I am a complete outsider to OpenStack but a fairer statement might be to say that I am a complete outside admirer. That said, I’m committed to the success of any innovation that furthers progress in converged infrastructure and especially in areas relating to management and orchestration ecosystems. I view management and orchestration ecosystems as being inclusive of formal ISV’s or in the case of OpenStack, community driven endeavors. Within OpenStack I see the promise of what is possible to accelerate timelines towards that end with the management and orchestration ecosystem for Vblock™ Systems. My contributions to OpenStack in the future – regardless of potential board involvement – will be to assist the OpenStack community in that manner.

2) Describe your experience with other non profits or serving as a board member. How does your experience prepare you for the role of a board member?

I have contributed both time and monetarily to non profits and community driven endeavors and those disclosures are represented in the disclosure portion of my blog. My experience as a board member has been limited to customer advisory boards and technical advisory boards of commercial entities and those disclosures are also represented in the disclosure portion of my blog. I view the OpenStack Board of Directors as an opportunity to contribute my time and energies for the benefit of the OpenStack community.

3) What do you see as the Board’s role in OpenStack’s success?

The OpenStack Board of Directors role in the success of OpenStack should center upon organizational concerns to identify, support, and provide succession planning for the core leadership team (the Office) for the OpenStack community. While any Board of Directors role discussion would include governance, for the sake of brevity, the Board’s role is to put the interests of the OpenStack community above their own.

4) What do you think the top priority of the Board should be during the OpenStack Foundation’s first year?

The top priority of the OpenStack Board of Directors should be establishing the core leadership team (the Office) for OpenStack and set timelines and appropriate bylaws to support and ensure sustainable succession planning.

So that’s me and my poing of view in a nutshell. If you are reading this and are part of the OpenStack community – please do vote even if it isn’t for me.

Progress comes in many forms but it rarely stems from a posture of apathy and the status quo. To that end I’ve been attempting to make progress on this blog. I can’t imagine why…

You see, I was a participating fan of them for many years. I was prolific. I commented anywhere and everywhere I could. I watched as comment forms evolved, expanded, rose, fall, soared, and failed.

Ah, the disclaimer by qthrul

In the history of my own blog experiments there were times when I would test out comment systems. Often, these were enhancements to Wordpress comments.  Over time the shift to a stand alone commenting environment occurred when companies like Disqus, IntenseDebate, LiveFyre, and pre-pivot versions of Echo made it possible to move the conversation to just about anywhere.

The so-called NASCAR problem of how to maintain the pseudo-non-repudiation side of things was always interesting. It started with Gravatar essentially grabbing the email address namespace as an anchor for identity. This was in stark contrast to the early hacked up Wordpress sites that become popular (see also code frozen lumbering teetering beasts prone to outages) where you could type anything that would fit in a web form text field. This ended with Facebook entering into the comments arena. Facebook comments kinda make me weep for humanity in general. Yahoo is there too but not as much so maybe I’ll look back one day and Yahoo will have fixed all that Facebook has done wrong.

Blog Spam by qthrul

So after a few more test runs and a review of the total comments ever received (no, I’m not ignoring comment spam uh… innovations) here on my own blog I decided that it was just silly to keep up with comments. In fact, I’ve even removed sharing options as of this post. I just don’t care about the social impact when there are many other ways to have it tracked and I am the one that has the web server logs (for now).

Does this mean I’m moving from my current Linode DIY environment to something Tumblr-esque like I did when I moved from my own colo box to something in the public IaaS cloud? Well, not exactly now I guess. Maybe? Sure. I’m always curious to try something new to me even if others have been doing it only that way ever.

There are folk that have never touched installation media. There are folks that have never connected or even put hardware together for their personal publishing desires. Does that make me a relic? Hardly.

Maybe I’m interested in what might pass for PaaS to enable what I once considered in my post regarding Evernote a while back – and that’s what I’d call a growing option. Never having to run OS updates again has a certain appeal.

It’s been a while since my last update. To say I’ve been busy within the Office of the CTO at VCE is a bit of an understatement. Busy having a blast.

Lately, I’m checking out how more often occurrences of VCE and Vblock appear in headlines or as a reference somewhere within tech blog posts on the blogosphere. It’s interesting to see what was below the radar begin to show up a bit more now.

Granted, some of the things I search for are niche or less intuitive but it’s fun to see what comes up in research. I was searching with a new service launched by the folks behind bit.ly called realtime that gives me a peek into even lesser shared articles out there that wouldn’t be found otherwise.

Side by side testing of realtime against even Google was impressive since it let’s you mask a search to, say, Linkedin, Facebook, or Twitter, etc… in a word? Brilliant!

What’s more interesting is just how completely off some of the more obscure references are that show up in my queries. Having been with VCE since 2010 I’ve come to the conclusion you can’t make this stuff up.

Comedy gravy. For example, an IBM oriented blog that earlier this month indicated… well… here:

Thus far, you might be thinking that the PureFlex System is the only platform for running SAP. ITG addresses that too. Other vendors are out there. Oracle and HP have some solutions that have not gained much traction in this area. The VCE consortium has attacked the SAP environment more aggressively, however, the ITG illustrates significant advantages in the PureFlex Systems including breadth of support and system integration. Probably even more important is that with VCE, you are dealing with three companies in the consortium. Who owns the vision and long term strategy? When you are investing in an enterprise level solution you want the confidence that your single solution provider owns the future of the product. Not even Rome could be ruled with three emperors!

Traction?  Three companies? Consortium?  Three emperors?

[ looks in closet to see if toga is on a hanger ]

A few points that come to mind…

1. The author is clearly confused.

2. The author is projecting regarding The Emperor’s New Clothes.

3. VCE is a company with investors that include Cisco, EMC, VMware, and Intel.

4. VCE and Vblock™ Systems are doing incredible things with SAP for customers.

5. See last point.

In fact, VCE produced a video detailing benefits to SAP customers that use Vblock Systems. So let’s try using that simple instructional video to bring a bit of clarity regarding how VCE and Vblock™ Systems are doing incredible things with SAP for customers.

Speaking of YouTube videos… When it comes to companies like HP, IBM, etc… let’s just say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

GAMEON!

Just a few weeks ago I fortunate to present in Rio at the CIO Latin America Summit 2012. The topic at that CIO event was innovation and I presented using SlideRocket which is now my go to deck creation service of choice.

The CIO event was a timely trip and I was able to work through what I was exposed to in Rio as I’ve traveled to NTCA events San Antonio and Hilton Head. Each time my opening remarks and the topics I address have been refined both in terms of my keynote presentation for NTCA companies as well as the workshops afterwards.

A few questions I’m addressing at my talks are simpler ones:

• What does it take to get in a state of mind where innovation flows?
• How does one make innovation a systematic embedded process in the organization?

A few questions I’m hoping I address are more complex ones:

• Where is the puck going to be? (i.e. the future of telecom)
• What does it mean to be a service provider of relevance?

Of course, when you are thinking about the future it can be daunting or exhilarating depending on your approach to the process. I’ve tried to stay high level and avoid the pitfalls of a purely technical talk and referencing the latest whiz bang gadget on the horizon. Also, the time afforded on stage could easily put a large group to sleep so I’ve attempted to mix up the format and flow into chunks of roughly 15-20 minutes per theme.

In fact, much of the material I pulled together for IP Possibilities 2010 and subsequent talks in 2010 are still pertinent and holding up well with age. For example, my decks relating to private cloud are still tracking nicely with the market moves. I’m also aware of my active roles before and after these decks were created.

In my talks at NTCA events this year I’ve opted for SlideRocket instead of SlideShare since it’s a great platform for the kind of series specific materials and regional updates I’ve been making. For all of my talks I’ve been making reference to some YouTube videos that I’ve found to be enjoyable on the topic of innovation. Some of them are short. Others go well beyond the threshold of 20 minutes.

Here are a few that I’ve made reference to:

It’s more than just a bigger office or more offices. It’s the whole vibe.

One of the concerns in any startup is the notion of culture and how that culture is shaped. You grow. You add to the mix of people, new customers, new directions, and new technology shifting with the hope of forging a culture that sustains and provides for innovation.

Sometimes if you are lucky you get to see this first hand. I think I’m pretty lucky.

I’m coming up on my two year mark with VCE. The folks that have been here longer than me have a perspective that I get to hear about from time to time. The new folks that just arrived are perspectives I get to hear about more and more as we grow. Seeing VCE through the eyes of those that came before me and those that have a front row seat to the future of VCE is hard to put into words but I think I can summarize it as a vision of hope and a runway that extends far enough to launch whatever we can dream up and dare to deliver.

Related to that… I’ve also taken on a new role within VCE. Again, as is customary, my title and role changes and I rotate to learn more and be humbled by the folks around me on a regular cadence. This time I’m happy to announce I’ve been added to the Office of the CTO at VCE. Yes, that’s right. I’m (back) on Team Trey.

I’ll be producing more content here in the coming weeks and elsewhere (I’ll link to it) that talk a bit more about the VCE perspective on a variety of topics. I’ll still be putting up my personal experiences at semi-random update intervals but my focus will be to publish early and often about all things VCE.

My experience in cutting off all public social media at the beginning of the year has crystallized how I’ll approach this new element of my work day.

For example, as I am tapping out this post I’m at Cisco Live US 2012 in San Diego meeting with customers, Cisco teams, and VCE folks that I’ve only known from emails, instant messages, WebEx sessions, and TelePresence. The announcements from Cisco and the VCE story during this Cisco event have been exciting to say the least. We even managed to pull off a massive tweetup with teams from EMC and Cisco this week.

I’m looking forward to deeper dive posts about how VCE is approaching and utilizing Cisco technologies like OTV along with EMC VPLEX and what it means for VCE partners and customers. Additionally, contrasting the paths to the right solution at the right time ranging from component Build Your Own to VSPEX to Vblock. In fact, I was able to do a video segment with Shashi Kiran from Cisco and Parmeet Chaddha from EMC this week on just that topic.

Where else have I been?

As I indicated in my last post a month ago, I was happy to get a chance to visit Brazil once again. This time I headed down to Rio for the CIO Latin America Summit to present on the topic of the VCE view on where the datacenter and our industry in general is headed. It’s not often you get to present in front of dozens of CIO’s so I was humbled to have the opportunity to do so. Also, being able to catch a sunrise in Rio is always a rare treat.

Right before Rio I had back to back visits to Las Vegas for Interop and EMC World for customer meetings. If you follow me on Instagram, Path, or Flickr you’ll see some of my image captures in my travels. I’ve been experimenting again with Tumblr for things like putting specific videos that I “add to Favorites” on YouTube, or photos posted to Flickr passed through a simple ifttt.com task to shove them into Tumblr as a video post. My Twitter updates that contain a URL are pulled into Delicious using ifttt.com as well. Flickr images are pulled in from Foursquare (via Path) or Instagram using, again you guessed it, ifttt.com so it’s a good way to keep up with where I’ve been and what I’ve captured along the way.

I also managed to fit in a few trips to the West coast to the coast of NC.  After Cisco Live wraps this week I’m also looking forward to Omaha VMUG, customer visits far and wide, any my speaking series through the remainder of the year. I’ll continue the use of Plancasts, TripIt, and the embeds on the sidebar here to give anyone ample time to keep up with me and where I’m headed. Let’s connect!

GAMEON!!!

My last trip took me to the VCE Boston office for a customer meeting and EBC.

Since taking a global role I’ve been spending a lot of time meeting with customers around the world. Sometimes that involves travel and using Cisco TelePresence. The use of Cisco TelePresence is a lot less wear and tear on your life and I’ve been fortunate enough to enjoy such global sessions with Singapore, Tokyo, Sydney, etc… and back in the US it makes it easy to be everywhere and anywhere at just about anytime people are awake.

I’m very fortunate to be working for VCE at a crucial time in the growth of the company. It’s good to take a step back and look at where you’ve been and look ahead to where you will be.

Here are few of the photos I’ve snapped while visiting Singapore, Tokyo, London, and Sydney.

In between these trips I’ve been all over the US too and it’s only May.

I hope to visit with customers in Brazil and Israel later this year. It’s been 10 years since I’ve been back to both but I’m looking forward to seeing Rio and Tel Aviv again soon.

One of the things I notice when attending technology events is the ability of the tech blog ecosystem to crank out coverage even before the event is over. Tech blog posts appear before the coffee carts are removed. Conclusions and predictions are posted at the speed of light.

Fascinating.

Indeed, these are long tech blog posts that say what folks must be thinking. There are fully worked out scenarios outlining explicit details and actions that must be taken by companies and their leaders per the social contract of the development community. Yes, these long tech blog posts are the blueprints for the solution.

There are examples where those tech blog writers aren’t even in attendance. These tech blog writers are just that good, that tuned in, and that hip to the low down of it all.

Fascinating.

As such, I’m starting to recommend that folks disconnect from any tech blog that uses the following conventions in any post.

• horse race metaphor
• physical violence metaphor
• hyperbole (all of it)
• all internal links
• war references (any and all of them)
• blatant refusal to use proper terminology
• consistent rivalry references
• catering to irrational fears
• writing about writing about writing (potentially about writing)

But I like reading the tabloids

Okay. Sure. It’s a guilty pleasure. We’ve all been there. So, let’s make a deal. For a week (or two), stop reading anything that has exhibited the prior list of things to watch out for. See how that feels. We’ll call this our little A/B test.

This is not a veiled GTD experiment. This is a cleansing of the impurities that build up from a steady diet of tech blog coverage. For the test, the general time collection method is simple. Determine the total time you normally spend on tech blog X, Y, and Z… use browser plugins or just guestimate if you are into that concept. Otherwise, how does 30 minutes sound?

Tech Blog Free Diet

Monday: Determine the tech community project you care the most about and engage in that community to see what is going on or spend more time you’d normally spend there

Tuesday: Do not read anything. Instead, organize your bookmarks and wonder why you saved them in the first place. Crazy, right?

Wednesday: Find two projects on Github, Google Code, SF, LP, or Codeplex, etc. and follow something or make a comment if you can

Thursday: If you use Twitter, only share links to the two projects you found on Wednesday, say it is awesome or worth checking out and tag it #blogaboutit

Friday: Determine what your favorite is, find out who the top 10 committers are, and send number 7, 8, 9, and 10 a personal thank you note if you can find them online easily.

ALL THESE TECH BLOGS ARE YOURS EXCEPT TECHMEME. ATTEMPT NO LANDINGS THERE.

Remember, this A/B experiment is our little secret.

Perhaps, just like the rise of meta summary curating services, there will be a community scale expansion that buries things not worthy of being read by folks regardless of where it is published or the SEO melange that pushes it to the top spot of seemingly arbitrary lists.