SBSC Newsletter - July 2009

June 24, 2009 – 7:59 pm
  You receive this communication as a benefit of your Microsoft Small Business Specialist Community membership. Welcome to the July 2009 SBSC Program News. This newsletter is designed to present the most current and relevant information about Microsoft incentives, promotions, and opportunities available for SBSC members. New SBSC Advisory Board Announced: A Strong Resource for All SBSC Members The SBSC Program Team has selected new SBSC Advisory Board members for the new Microsoft fiscal year starting July 1, 2009. The role of the SBSC Advisory Board is to provide Microsoft with real-life feedback and ground-level intelligence about what is important for SBSCs. This year there is one SBSC Advisory Board member in each of the 10 Microsoft U.S. Sales Areas. SBSC Advisory Board members are committed and eager to be the local partner liaison between you and Microsoft. If you want to find the SBSC Advisory Board member in your region, and share the ...

Posted in MS Partners, SBSC | No Comments »

Partners in Christ Annual Prayer Breakfast at WPC 09

June 24, 2009 – 7:45 am
SAVE-THE-DATE! Join Microsoft partners and employees from around the world for a time of fellowship and prayer at the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference New Orleans Marriott at the Convention Center 859 Convention Center Boulevard New Orleans, Louisiana 70130 Wednesday, July 15, 2009 7:00 - 8:00 a.m. Click Here to Register Today! Are you able to help fund this special outreach?  We are looking for donations of any size to help offset the cost of hosting this breakfast.  We project a need for $4000 to cover the venue and expenses associated.  Any donation will be greatly appreciated.  Any company that donates $500 or more will be listed as a sponsor of the event.  Is God leading you to participate?  Email me or the address below for more information. We also will be having prayer time on Mon, Tues, Thur and Fri mornings at 6:30 AM.  It will be held at the Residence Inn New Orleans Convention Center at 345 St. Joseph ...

Posted in Events, MS Partners | No Comments »

Sane People, Insane Statements

June 23, 2009 – 9:06 am
My new favorite book “Re-Imagine” by Tom Peters if full of paragraphs titled “Sane People, Insane Statements.  The are statements from sane people that cause you to pause and say “holly crap, what if…”.  For example Greg Blonder, venture capitalist and former chief technical advisor for corporate strategy at AT&T said, “In 25 years, you’ll probably be able to get the sum total of all human knowledge on a personal device.”   Crazy?  A little. Unimaginable? Apparently not. Today, the semi-sane Vlad writes “The only bright news for the VAR industry is that there is plenty of work out there painting and putting up drywall in all the forclosure properties.” Is he wrong as he summarizes his predictions of the impact of cloud computing? Why don’t you form a quick opinion.  Try this. Image a world where computers have no need for local data storage.  Imaging a world where the small/medium business owners have spent their entire ...

Posted in Rants, SaaS | 7 Comments »

The Client Vendor Relationship - Get a Helmet!

June 5, 2009 – 5:09 pm
Wow, three YouTube postings in 2 days.  I'm sure you convinced that all I do is surf videos.  I wish.  This came from my SBS Group Co-Lead in an email while I was recovering my servers this morning.  Enjoy and TGIF!!!

Posted in Fun, Managing Your Business | No Comments »

New Microsoft TV Ads for bing

June 5, 2009 – 8:01 am
Check out the new ads for Microsoft's new search engine called "bing".  Please share your thoughts on these ads in the comments.  Do you think MS has a shot against big G?

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Wii 4 Sale! Project Natal Here I Come!

June 4, 2009 – 9:09 am
Wow!  I just saw the new video on the XBOX 360 Project Natal (below) and I'm ready to sell my sell my Wii game system and all the crap I bought to go with it for this.  The kewl part is that I have a new XBOX 360 Elite sitting right in front of me that I won this spring but didn't know what to do with.  Sweeeeet!  Of couse this is for my kids.  Ya, thats right for my kids.  ;-) BTW, you have to meet Milo at the end.  Amazing! 

Posted in Fun | 1 Comment »

Windows Vista and Server 2008 SP2 Released

June 4, 2009 – 8:23 am
Microsoft has announced the public release of Windows Vista and Server 2008 SP2.  I don't know about you but I'm skipping SP2 on all my machines and going straight to Win 7 on ALL my PCs (see this blog).  Here is the blurb from TechNet this AM: Windows Vista Service Pack 2 and Windows Server 2008 Service Pack 2 Available for Download Service Pack 2, the latest service pack for both Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista, is now available for public download. SP2 supports new types of hardware and emerging hardware standards, includes all of the updates that have been delivered since SP1, and simplifies deployment for consumers, developers, and IT professionals. For more details, see the TechNet page for Service Pack 2 for Windows Server 2008 and Windows Vista. Microsoft also announced that within 30 days of the May 11 release of Windows Server 2008 RC revealed at Tech·Ed, the System Center ...

Posted in Technology | No Comments »

Autotask Community Juggernaut Releases Email2AT Beta

June 1, 2009 – 4:10 pm
Travis Austin, of Rezitech,  a young man who made quite a splash in the SMB community and Autotask circle when introduced for the first time at the Autotask CommunITy Live event this spring, has released his first Autotask community focused service called Email2AT.  Email2AT (short for email to Autotask but not so named for legal reasons I'm sure) is a cloud based service that utilizes Email2DB to parse them insert or merge data into Autotask.   While it is no less impressive then some of the nice "work-around" scripts I've seen Travis post in the Autotask Forums, this one has the potential to provide a valuable service that Autotask has determined is out of scope for their offerings.  The Email2AT beta went public today on Autotask's community forum and invited users to put some load on the service so Travis can fix the major issues.  The beta will consist of two feature ...

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Hey SBSCs! I’mmm Back!!!

May 22, 2009 – 7:18 am
Thought you could get rid of me that easily didn't you?  Well it seems I just can't turn down the opportunity (and privilege) to serve my SBSC community.  I've been asked to contribute this year (Microsoft FY10) on the SBSC US Advisory Board.  The board will be made up of 10 SBSC partners - one from each of the 10 Microsoft US Regions.  To be one of ten out of over 7500 SBSC partners asked to be in this group is a great honor.  Our goal is to work with Francois Daumard and Arni Mondloch from Microsoft to make the SBSC (soon to be SMB competency or something similar)  the best it can be in the US.  And trust me, these guys mean business.  They are laser focused on the success of SBSC.  Period!  With advice and feedback echoed from from fellow SBSC peers like you back to Microsoft, ...

Posted in MS Partners, Microsoft, SBS Community, SBSC | 4 Comments »

I’m in LOVE!!!

May 21, 2009 – 8:06 pm
Wow!  All I can say is wow!   Sitting in the back of a room at Microsoft listening to a couple of TS2 guys and Rhonda Layfield present on Window 7 I decided to pull the trigger an d did a clean install to Win 7 RC1.  The Toshiba Satellite with a Vista “Capable” that has never really run Vista very well loaded the OS in under 45 minutes from boot to insert key.  After asking for my key it then performed a miracle, it showed me a list of wireless networks to connect to.  Holly crap.  If you had any idea what I had to go thru to get my wrls to work in Vista.  Then after installing a couple hand things like RDC files for my terminal server apps and Windows Live toolbar I decided to plug in my Logitech cam with no software handy.  It instantly went out ...

Posted in Technology | 2 Comments »