Geek Speak

Geeks gotta live life to the fullest and have fun where we can find it. As a tech exec, summer was also a fantastic time to participate in festivals, events, reading and (gasp) vacation time. It’s also when a lot of worthy causes deserve your geek love. 

 In the past, myself and family participated in numerous multi-day bikeathons for numerous causes such raising pledges for the National MS Society. Most recently I participated in and completed (see the pic yay!) the American Cancer Society’s July 2025 5-mile Swim Challenge here in the Texas Hill Country outside Austin. 

 The SMB MSP community was built on exactly that: community. Over the epoch from SBS and beyond, we’ve always come together in different ways depending on the need. Here are a few past and present examples. 

 MSP Navy

We rallied the geeks to assist with Hurricanes Katrina and Harvey. In NOLA with Katrina it was legendary SBS MVP Jeff Middleton leading the way in his hometown. So inspired we were that a few SBSers went to New Orleans to assist. 

Mine is “Far From Home” by Lisa Murkowski and Charles Wohlforth. It’s the story of senior US Senator Murkowski’s journey growing up in Alaska to a long-time tenure in the US Senate. I’ve just completed chapter one and will periodically check-in with you from bucolic coffee shops in the Texas Hill Country. Such is life as we recover from the devastating floods in the region. 

Overview

Harry Brelsford and Dux Raymond Sy discuss the latest developments at Avepoint, a global leader in data security, data resilience, and data governance. AvePoint has introduced new features on its Elements platform to help managed service providers (MSPs) scale their business in data security and IT management across various platforms like Microsoft, Google, and Salesforce. Dux, the Chief Brand Officer, highlights the importance of data security for AI and the company's 20-year history. He also mentions AvePoint partner program, launched three years ago, and its success in helping partners build new services and recurring revenue. Dux shares his recent travels to Europe and emphases the growing demand for AI and data security solutions.

Ever wondered what to do with all those Amazon boxes you receive with consumable product goods (CPG) that nearly (ok all) readers receive. Sure the easy answer is to trot them thar boxes to the green recycling receptacle, flat ‘em and toss ‘em in without a second thought. 

But there is another way and I learned it from the smarty PhD pants in Los Alamos, NM (home to the National Labs). Instead of recycling the cardboard boxes, how about reuse? 

Welcome to the Maker Movement 2.0

It’s very simple and I don’t need 800+ words to lay it out. But seeing that a lot of my audience is in Texas and surrounding southern states, I’m going to go REAL SLOW. 

Just in time for the Christmas and Hanukkah holidays, the SS SMB Nation has arrived at the island of misfit tech toys. Here is the exclusive scoop.

Using the holiday break to reflect, recharge and renew, I gathered up all my misfit tech toys that are consigned to a shelf in my home office LOL. Then I placed them on the SMB Nation sailing vessel for arrival just in time for Santa to distribute to up-and-coming geeks world wide.

A quick peek of the snap show a few highlights.

Harry Brelsford and David Tulip discuss their professional history and experiences in the IT industry. David shares his journey from joining Newman Business Solutions in 1995 to growing their IT department into a £1.5 million MSP by 2009. He now leads the Network Group, which supports around 100 technology service providers in the UK. They reflect on the IT Nation 2024 conference, highlighting its educational focus and high attendance of 4,500 people. David mentions upcoming events for the Network Group in 2025, including celebrating their 30th anniversary at Wembley Stadium and expanding their reach to 250 organizations over the next three years.

A common refrain in technology (heck any area) is the need to both stay current and lean forward to remain relevant. Like you, I can remember pivoting from the sad demise of Novell NetWare to Window Server (remember NT?) leading up to the granddaddy of all migrations: the end-of-life (EOL) *and* and of service of Windows Small Business Server (SBS) to whatever (cloud et. al.). Do you realize that all happened in 2014 - ten years ago. This was the same timeframe as the Windows XP (EOL). Another example of voluntary (for some of you it was involuntary) professional evolution from break-fix to the Managed Service Provider (MSP) business model based on monthly recurring revenue (MRR) (invented by the telcos IMHO)

Here We Grow Again - Looking Around the Corner into 2025

I recently attended a keynote at the Mindset Reset conference

Calling the NERD HERD!

Be There - the Holiday Party for the Rest of Us! 

Our most popular mantra and message to IT Pros, Managed Services Providers (MSP), Geeks and Nerds is that you are NOT ALONE! 

I’m not claiming to be Nostrdammus with his legendary forecasting capabilities in the 1500s. But the data doesn’t lie and I saw it with my own eyes. Let’s geek out on this. 

Dropping Prices

Let’s start with the end-in-mind as author Stephen Covey said in his book “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.”  So the end of the story is about the housing market: buy, sell or short.

GEEK WIN!!!  I cut the cords today! Finally I sat down and reduced Spectrum down to Internet-only and then added YouTube TV. Total bill went from $280 to $140!  Should done this a lot sooner...other thoughts.

Spectrum kept trying to throw in a new mobile phone (boo hiss - I don't need another phone)

For free - Spectrum added a goofy TV service called TV Stream with 90+ Tier 2 channels I either get with YouTube TV or don't care about...

In other cable provider/streaming news:

Join us for this important online on November 12th - here are the dets!

Welcome to the forthcoming 2025! Join our expert panel as we double-click into this migration scenario impacts SMB partners, MSPs, VARS who depend on MAPs to run da’ IT business and serve customers. Not many people are aware of this quickly forthcoming change so its CRITICAL you attend this Webinar to get the FACTS to insure the continuity of your business operations.

After quickly re-defining MAPs and its history, we’ll look at the fourth pathways to MIGRATE off of MAPS.

And we’ll save plenty of time so you can ASK your important migration questions

Date and Time:

November 12, 2024

1:00pm CT

Panelists