On Tuesday 08 November 2005 16:22, Jim Van Meggelen wrote: > For a corporate entity looking for a more formal look at this > new-fangled open-source telecom phenomenon, I suspect they'll find their > money was well spent. The folks at IPSandO have produced some very well > regarded seminars, conferences, training and what-all else. For a > manager with a $10,000 training budget per employee (pretty typical in > telecom, if I recall), that $200 would be well spent, I'd warrant.
Well that's the whole point -- For those large companies with the $10k budget just for training they'll have already gone with one of the commercial vendors who come knocking (Mitel in particular)... It's my observation that Asterisk is a HUGE hit with the SOHO and SMB crowds... the crowds who look at a $200 seminar and say "huh?" I mean hell the all-day very technical seminars I used to go to for embedded stuff were only half that and in places like the convention centre or what I refer to as the "old" convention centre south of YYZ. They had breakfast and lunch provided, you walked away with a fairly hefty set of manuals, binders and usually some kind of bag, pen, shirt, etc. all marketing the company who put it on (Analog Devices, TI, Burr-Brown, Microchip and National Semiconductor, to name a few)... These are all larger companies than Digium, sure, but even the smaller lunch'n'learns put on by companies like J&D Systems and MiSYS were four or five hours long and included lunch, gratis. I'm just saying that Digium seems to be looking at this as an opportunity to make money, both by having them over and also by getting them sold on Asterisk and Digium hardware... I don't know how effective that is. > <plug>Or you can buy our book</plug> Very, very true. However people inclined to buy the book are already interested enough to make an effort to learn. These "meet and greets" are usually aimed at a far less inclined crowd, and US$200 will push a lot of them away. -A.
