I had a 10-year-old NEC PBX. Two analog trunks, eight or 10 digital phones, and a bunch of outlets wired for analog phones from the days in which guests needed to access their corporate networks through a modem connection. The voicemail card failed. To replace it would cost a couple of thousand dollars. I went… [Read More]
Archives for August 2011
VoIP — part 2
Let’s get some background and terminology out of the way first. What the heck is a PBX? The letters stand for private branch exchange: private because it is located on the customer’s premises, branch because it connects to the public switched network on one side and phones on the other side – it’s the end… [Read More]
A musician’s advice for photographers
In the latest issue of Acoustic Guitar magazine, there’s an interview with Richard Thompson. In his answer to a question about how much his songwriting is driven by knowledge and how much by experimentation, Thompson says something that photographic artists can take to heart. Just replace the musical references with photographic ones. There are many… [Read More]
VoIP – part 1
Back in the early 80s, when was working for Rolm, having left engineering and begun a two-year tour as general manager of Office Systems Division, I used to spend a lot of time speaking at conferences. We had a lot of circuit switching data communications products and the promise of future centralized packet switching products,… [Read More]
What’s artistic development — part 2
Can art — as opposed to craft — be taught? I don’t think so, at least not directly, but artists can be taught things that allow them to find a path to making better art. There’s an analogy with creativity. I think the following statements are true of both creativity and artistic ability. Everybody’s got… [Read More]