> -----Original Message----- > From: Robert Roach [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] > Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 7:29 PM > To: asterisk-biz@lists.digium.com > Subject: [asterisk-biz] Open Proposal > > This letter is addressed to all the businesses like mine that are > developing, deploying and supporting Asterisk based PBX systems for the > small to medium size business market. > > I believe that we are starting to see a need for a formal organization > that is focused exclusively on supporting our business model. > > Our customers have specific needs, both from a product and business > perspective, that present unique challenges to us and differentiates us > from companies deploying Asterisk for call centers and independent > consultants. > > IMO, it is our common focus and background that not only presents > challenges, but gives us an opportunity to leverage our common interests > to build a stronger product. > > In addition, I'll suggest that the majority of us are, by virtue of > working in relative isolation from one another, on the whole duplicating > a lot of effort in terms of product development, sales and marketing and > human resources. > > In short, there must be a way for us to combine our resources, apply the > virtues of Open Source Development to our business model and thereby > realize the common goals of lowering business costs, speeding product > development, increasing quality and last but not least, providing a > global support organization to provide a fall back to both our customers > and ourselves. > > A bit of background: Last June I attended Astricon in Madrid and floated > the idea of an Asterisk Business Consortium - A group of like minded > companies across the globe, sharing a common business goal and working > together to share resources. At the time, I met with a decidedly mixed > response to the idea. Most people were choosing the go-it-alone > strategy. Speaking to Digium about it, they are focused - rightly so - > on growing their own business. However, based on what I have read > recently on this list - notably Michael's recent request for a 24x7 help > desk - it seems that the time has come to make a more formal proposal to > the community at large. > > > My proposal is to create an organization comprised of member companies > to address the following issues: > > 1. Business Related > > a. Customer Support - Need for 24x7x365 support for Asterisk > installations. > > b. Continuation 'Insurance'- Provide an umbrella organization to give > your customers the assurance that they are not necessarily relying on > you as the single source for future support/upgrade of the system. > > c. Boiler plate contracts - In as much is practical - develop 'standard' > contracts to offer customers. > > d. Marketing - Sharing the development of marketing materials e.g. data > sheets, FAQs, etc > > > 2. Technical > > a. Standardization of 3^rd party application integration to the Asterisk > platform (Jive IM Server, AsterFAX, Sugar CRM integration, etc). We > would all benefit from having a coordinated effort in this area reducing > duplication of effort. > > b. Internal development of Asterisk related applications - In order to > fill voids in functionality, we can again make a coordinated effort to > build the applications we need. IMO, relying on third party proprietary > applications for critical features introduces an element of risk into > our product based on the viability of the 3^rd party's business. > Additionally, you don't have direct control over the development time > line or features. > > c. 'Standardized' extended functionality for dial plans - For example, a > speed dial implementation or password protected extensions - As this is > not supported natively in Asterisk - it is implemented in any of a > variety of ways by each of us. Difficult for a 3rd party to troubleshoot > and again working in silos duplicating effort. > > > Near Term Tangible Benefits. > > I can think of several, but two specific examples spring to mind. > > First, our business is based in South East Asia, but some of our > customers have offices in the US. We would like to have a reliable > partner to service the remote offices. As each new customer presents > their own unique scenario, building relationships with other Asterisk > support companies on the fly on a one-off basis is just too time > consuming and potentially risky. > > Second, our company has developed a GUI for business users that is > specifically NOT a graphical representation of the Asterisk dial plan, > but is rather a user centric application giving them desktop SMS > features, call forwarding customization, extension password protection > etc in a format which does not require any knowledge of how a dial plan > is configured. I know that others out there have done the same. If we > had coordinated our efforts from the outset we would likely have saved > time, have a more robust and feature full application. It is still early > in the deployment cycle for Asterisk overall and we can still capture > some of these benefits. > > > How would this work? > > I think most everyone would agree that the above goals are laudable, but > just how can you get everyone to agree on how it should be implemented > is the tough part. I have a rough draft of ideas on how to execute this, > but at this stage, I'd like to get some reactions from all of you to see > if this is something worth pursuing. > > > Regards, > > Rob >
24x7 Asterisk Helpdesk phone support will be online shortly at www.asteriskhelpdesk.com. Thanks, Steve Totaro _______________________________________________ --Bandwidth and Colocation provided by Easynews.com -- asterisk-biz mailing list To UNSUBSCRIBE or update options visit: http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-biz