Sitka - Day 4 report

Here's a pic of our day 4 results. Back to Seattle with over 100 lbs of King and Coho salmon along with a mess of halibut!!!

What an awesome trip. Kudos to the folks at Angling Unlimited - they really took care of us.

From Sitka

From Sitka

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Sitka, Alaska

Sitka - Day 3 report

What can I say? More king & coho salmon caught along with some halibut. Lots more wild life today including getting to see some orcas...

From Sitka

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Sitka, Alaska

Sitka - Day 2 report

Another day of not being able to keep count of all the whales I saw. Also got to see an ocean otter today along with a few Sitka deer. Managed to catch a halibut and a King salmon today along with a bunch more coho's. I was the only one on the boat to catch a King - we're allowed one each - so tomorrow we're hoping that everyone catches their King...

We fished with Mt. Edgecombe in the background most of the day. It's an ancient volcano that reminds us that the edge of the Pacific is quite a hot spot of volcanic and techtonic activity. If you take a look at the picture below you'll see Mt. Edgecombe and at the water's edge you'll can see the old lava tubes of the volcano.

From Sitka

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Sitka, Alaska

Sitka - Day 1 report

Sitka

Just click on the picture above and you will be taken to my Sitka album on Picasaweb. Lots of great shots of the fish we're catching, wildlife and scenery. It's official: I've lost count of all the eagles and whales I've seen just today. Truly awesome.

Just to wet your appetites and hopefully make a few of you jealous here's a few of the pics...

My catch so far: King (1) and Coho (1) salmon, halibut (2), sole (1) and a butt-ugly "pea" cod (1).

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Sitka, Alaska

Catalyst!

Well, next week is Burton Group's famous Catalyst conference. I've been going to this conference since their 1996 Colorado Springs event - 10 years without missing a single one. I started when I was with Zoomit, then continued to attend when I was with Microsoft, then Vintela and last year with Quest Software.

But this year I'm not going. Since moving to the Pacific Northwest in 1999 I've always wanted to go fishing in Alaska. I finally booked a trip early last year and unfortunately it turned out that Catalyst conflicted once they announced the dates. Looks like my record is broken.

I'm heading off to Sitka tomorrow to hook up with our hosts Captain Tom and Chuck at Angling Unlimited. We'll be fishing for Alaskan halibut and King Salmon. If all goes well, the new freezer I bought will receive 100-150lbs of this stuff when I get back next Thursday.

There's lots of pictures to be taken, tall tales to be told and fish to be caught! Wish me luck and give my regards to the Catalyst gang...

Do you think they have wi-fi up there?!

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Catalyst, Burton Group

Quest acquires ScriptLogic!

Looks like Quest acquired ScriptLogic for $90M today! Awesome! ScriptLogic is going to operate as a wholly-owned subsidiary. I love Script's tools as they are especially suited for small and medium-business customers.

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Quest Software

The 15,000 foot view...

I took off last night from Seattle to head to Salt Lake City for some meetings. Based on the drive to the airport I knew we'd have some awesome views of Mt. Rainer on the climb out of Sea-Tac. Most time that I take this flight the plane will pass to the right of Mt. Rainier so I confirmed that with the pilot while we were standing in the boarding area. Fortunately, it was a SouthWest flight so I got to pick my seat.

Here's the view I had...

I took this picture with a Canon 30D digital SLR sporting a Canon 70-200mm IS "L" lens.

Microsoft, Patents and the Soprano's - Part #2

Previously, I referred to a post by my buddy Steve Walli on Microsoft and patents. John Fontana over at Network World has written another interesting article around this area. Some quotes of note:

“The reality is that they (Microsoft) are not going to sue a single customer,” says Jim Zemlin, executive director of the Linux Foundation. “It would not be in their business interest. Microsoft is not going to sue their customers.”

I totally agree with that. I believe it would be disastrous to Microsoft themselves if they started to do this. Suing about piracy is one thing. Suing about patent violation is another. It could work if Microsoft were the underdog but this is definitely not the case. Who likes the neighborhood bully??

I would be shocked if Microsoft didn’t have patents that read on Linux,” said Mark Radcliffe, a partner at law firm DLA Piper US who advises companies on intellectual property issues. “Will they enforce them is the question. Companies using Linux don’t have to fear patent suits.”

I'm not a lawyer but I thought that if you have a patent and don't enforce it that you can be shown to have "abandoned" your claim to that patent. If that's true then it will be interesting to see how this does turn out because time is not on Microsoft's side!

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Microsoft, open source

It's a Journey - Not a Destination

OK, I know you thought it would never end but finally, the conclusion of my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 and Part #3 are also now available.


IT’S A JOURNEY—NOT A DESTINATION
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

Someone on your team is responsible for the identity management project timeline. This timeline dictates that, on a certain date, the project will be done. The problem is that the project will never be done. Period.

If your identity management project actually does end, then you, or your successor, will likely be starting a new one within 10 years. Why? Because all of the same mistakes will occur all over again. Internal developers will begin building new applications with their own authentication and authorization stores without thinking to re-use the existing corporate identity stores. Or, someone will purchase new enterprise applications without thinking about identity and whether the application support industry standards; thus, more synchronization will be necessary.

Kicking off—and finishing—an identity management project is simply one point in the continuum of your company’s life. Identity management needs to continue for as long as the company exists. You need to set standards, and build guidance and awareness across the company about your identity management strategy, the problems it solves and its business benefits. The project may conclude, but the problems never cease.

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep.” Congratulations on finishing your project, but don’t even think of going to sleep!

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identity management, Quest Software

Tenet #12 - Don’t Forget the Monitoring and Operational Requirements!

Here's tenet #12 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Don’t Forget the Monitoring and Operational Requirements!

I’ve seen countless organizations forget this. It’s a check-box in the RFP and is extremely important!

In many larger enterprises, one group manages the operations of production infrastructure components. Typically, this group is involved in some way with the purchase of infrastructure products. The group can influence how the company will monitor and handle the day-to-day operations of software that’s acquired. However, in many smaller companies, such a group either doesn’t exist or it isn’t involved in the software acquisition. This is not a trivial requirement. If you’ve done a proper POC (see previous tenet), you know at least whether a vendor’s products can handle your environment. But, if something happens and things start to fall apart, will you have advance warning? If so, how? From an operational perspective, will you have the tools to diagnose problems or will every hiccup lead to a call to the vendor’s support hotline?

Have you already deployed a monitoring product like Tivoli, OpenView or Microsoft Operations Manager? If so, will your identity management product integrate with your monitoring package? If not, does it have built-in monitoring? While built-in monitoring is better than no monitoring, your operations staff really shouldn’t have to monitor yet another console.

Day-to-day operational requirements are also something to examine closely. How do you back up the solution? How do you perform full and partial restores? Does the product require a database back-end? If so, is that database one of the standards within your organization? If mySQL is not one of your company standards and your identity management software requires mySQL, you are going to be forced to adopt new operational procedures. The same goes for programming languages and interfaces. One European identity management vendor’s programming interface is limited to TQL. TQL may be the best programming language to use, but how many developers know TQL? If you choose this system, you will be paying expensive consulting rates for implementing and customizing your project.

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identity management, Quest Software

Tenet #11: Proof of Concept? Isn’t the Sales Presentation Enough?

Here's tenet #11 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Proof of Concept? Isn’t the Sales Presentation Enough?

It certainly is not! When I was selling identity management products at ZoomIT, there were a number of things that customers would ask me that I hated to hear. One of them was the dreaded, "Can you do a proof of concept?" Sometimes, it would come out as, "We want all the short-listed vendors to do a proof of concept". Even though the requests made me shudder, you should not move forward on an identity management project without asking vendors to do a proof of concept (POC) statement. Vendors may push back and ask you to pay for it, but don’t back down. They should either absorb the cost of a POC statement as part of their pre-sales expenses or, at a bare minimum, offer you 100 percent credit for anything you spend on the POC statement. Remember what I said earlier about partnering. If vendors don’t want to do a POC statement or are forcing you to pay for it without any credit, then are they really interested in partnering with you?

Here are some points about POCs:

• Visiting the vendor’s lab to see the software work is not a POC; that’s called a demonstration! A POC has to be done in your environment, not theirs.

• Assemble your most important (or all!) scenarios and use them as the basis for the POC. Don’t make a decision to purchase by only seeing 10 to 40 percent of the functionality you need proven.

• Stress test any system by simulating a full load of events or all of your users. Many systems work great but fall apart when they are stressed. Make sure you don’t find out about this after you’ve purchased the product.

• Don’t forget your network infrastructure! Most organizations have varying networking environments, which might include: satellite or slow links between sites, intermittent connectivity, varying topologies, communications with mainframes, and any number of other weird networking factors. Don’t forget about these in your POC. Most software assumes gigabit, continuous, no-lag connectivity everywhere!

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identity management, Quest Software

Tenet #10 - Be Informed—Check References, Talk to Other Companies

Here's tenet #10 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Be Informed—Check References, Talk to Other Companies

Another aspect of bottom-up research will be talking to other companies that are facing similar problems. This is important for two reasons. The first is that they might have encountered something that you didn’t think about, or perhaps they came up with an interesting solution that you weren’t aware of. The second is to do reference checks to support a specific solution. This is very important when you are making your vendor choice. Here are some things to remember when you are doing reference checks.

• Is the company using the product you are thinking about purchasing?

This may sound like an obvious question but I have seen vendors give a reference and the reference was using a one of their products with glowing results, but it wasn’t the product the company was thinking about purchasing! Make sure you are comparing apples to apples.

• Has the company actually deployed the product? Is it using the product? For how long?

This also may sound like an obvious question but there is a big difference between simply purchasing a product and having it deployed and operational over an extended period of time. Maybe the product is too services-intensive and it hasn’t been put into operation yet? This happens frequently. Or perhaps the product doesn’t actually do what it says it does. This also happens frequently. You’d be surprised at the number of customers who actually purchase a solution based only on a salesperson’s presentation. Would you purchase a car based solely on the information in a few brochures? I bet you wouldn’t.

• What feedback does the company have about the vendor’s stated commitment on the after-purchase services, support and maintenance?

You need to determine if the vendor is going to be a partner, or if you are simply going to be a customer. You want to work with a vendor that is going to fully support you as you get the product deployed and in production. You also want to ensure that post-production support and maintenance are first rate. Questions worth asking: How have you requested product enhancements? Do you know who the product manager is? Have you talked to the product manager? Does the vendor have a customer advisory board or council? Is there a user group? How do you become a partner with your vendor?

• What are the vendor’s development plans and product timelines?

Ask for them, but don’t believe them. At least, don’t believe the dates. Apply the Wosinski co-efficient7 to all dates. Be highly suspicious if the features you want or need are scheduled for delivery too far out on the timeline. Do you want to see the salesperson’s hair catch on fire? Just ask him or her to tie performance or delivery of features to payment. It’s worth pushing for this just to see the ensuing spectacle!

• What kind of vendor are you dealing with? Is it small, a start-up, venture capital–funded or a publicly traded company? If it’s a small company, what happens to your contracts if in an acquisition?

Sometimes it’s better to work with small company because your money means more to them. You can have greater influence on product direction. But with small companies, resources may be an issue. Will they have the consultants, the partners or the ecosystem to support you? Will they be around in five to 10 years? Larger companies typically have a bigger ecosystem, more industry partnerships and more people to work with. However, it may be more difficult to get product enhancements from them. Either way, it’s a trade-off, but also a decision you consciously make.

Carefully check references. Develop a good set of questions. Make sure the customers you contact haven’t been incented as references. Be sure that you are forming a partnership that will last once the check has cleared the bank. And, whatever you do, count on a changing vendor environment.

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identity management, Quest Software

Tenet #9 - Beware of Vendor ROI, TCO, and Other Trappings—YMWV

Here's tenet #9 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Beware of Vendor ROI, TCO, and Other Trappings—YMWV

Face it—vendors have one goal in mind: to separate you from your money. They will provide you with all kinds of ROI and total cost of ownership (TCO) spreadsheets that will promise extraordinary savings in a matter of months. Beware of these reports. Take all of this with many grains of salt. Ask the vendors if they will help you define and, more importantly, stand behind the metrics for the projects to prove those savings and watch them scurry for the exit. Can these reports be used as baselines where savings and ROI might come from? Absolutely. They may give you new ideas for where you can find savings, but don’t take these ideas to your manager or CFO unless you’re willing to put your butt on the line regarding what the vendors are representing. (And my advice to you is that doing so may be a CLM—career-limiting move).

Another area for caution concerns third-party promotional material. In many cases, companies have paid for product reviews or have ensured that the business scenarios in which their products are reviewed will illuminate their products in the best possible light. When industry analysts write papers about market segments such as identity management, they have their own prejudices, angles and chests to thump, notwithstanding the fact that every software company has a room full of people whose job it is to influence those analysts. Again, exercise caution and take everything with a grain of salt.

I have always advised both a top-down and bottom-up approach to choosing vendors. A top-down approach is gathering research from the Web, industry analysts and trade magazines (for example, eWeek, CIO Magazine, Network Computing, Network World). This will provide good information and general guidance, but keep in mind what I said earlier. A bottom-up approach involves reading the vendor’s Web site and product literature, and testing its product in your lab using your business scenarios and use cases.

Remember, your mileage will vary.

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identity management, Quest Software

The Microsoft federation advantage

James McGovern hits the nail on two heads in his blog post The Battle Between SAML and WS-Federation...

1. James first nails it around Microsoft's inherent advantage of shipping technology as part of the operating system. In other words, at no additional charge. Euphemistically called "bundling" by the DOJ. (Emphasis is mine)

For example, if Progressive wanted to federate with Citigroup, they would probably do so using SAML and a lot of the discussions in terms of the Liberty Alliance have targeted this demographic. One should ask themselves how federation would change if Progressive wanted to federate with all of their other business partners, most of which don't have dedicated IT staff nor the budget to buy separate standalone products and instead prefer to see federation support built into products they already use such as the operating system. This is where WS-Federation in terms of implementation will win hands down over SAML.

2. Microsoft's rose-colored glasses around XrML is preventing them from actively embracing XaCML. (Emphasis is mine)

The one thing I see that SAML 2.0 supports that no one is talking about in the WS-Federation camp is in support of XACML. The WS-Federation camp is overhyping identity while avoiding any discussions as to the problem space enterprises face related to disparate authorization models. To be fair, the SAML community has defined the specification but none of the vendors who support SAML actually bridge SAML to XACML.

#1 enables Microsoft to eventually win the battle that James discusses. #2 could potentially hold us ("the user") all back - I'm not really seeing any XrML-based products or interfaces for Windows Server & IIS being cranked up...


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authorization, federation, Active Directory Federation Services, WS-*, SAML,

Tenet #8 - Have Clear Metrics to Measure Success

Here's tenet #8 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Have Clear Metrics to Measure Success

This is so important. The last thing you want is to have an executive say, "So what?" about your project. Have a set of very clear metrics that you can apply and report on as part of the justification for your project, and as a way to show your success. All too often, this aspect of an identity management project is either left out or is based on "soft" savings.

Some of the metrics that tend to get the attention of executives and bean counters are:

1. Reduction in number of help desk calls. This is a good metric especially if your help desk is outsourced or staffed by contractors. It will result in hard-dollar savings because with fewer help desk calls, you will need less help desk staff and lower your per incident costs.

2. Improved security. If you can report on pre- and post-implementation times to de-provision a user from your human resource (HR) system(s), you can claim you are increasing security. This is not a hard-dollar savings, but it is extremely important to your executive team, board of directors and CISO for both regulatory compliance and general security reasons.

3. Improved productivity. Most executives will be indifferent if you tell them you are going to improve productivity by 10 minutes a day per user in your company. If you aren’t directly saving the company money, you’ll probably get the dreaded "So what?" comment. Do you have any contractors working for you? If you do, you can turn this into real hard-dollar savings by measuring the time it takes for contractors to access all the systems they need to do their jobs both pre- and post-project implementation. Those contractors are idle while they wait for their access. If you can provision them faster, you can show a substantial savings. The more contract staff you have, the bigger this savings will be.

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identity management, Quest Software

Soprano's finale...a brilliant market test?

The Soprano's finale ended in a way that it could start up again, be spun off or any number of things could make it the prelude to something else. I think it's interesting the way that HBO ended it. It's really a very measurable market test. Why?

When the Soprano's season started in April, I turned on HBO. Tomorrow, I'll turn it off.

I won't be the only one. If there's many like me, I wonder how long it is before HBO announces something?

Tenet #7 - Be an Agent of Change

Here's tenet #7 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Be an Agent of Change—Internally and with Your Suppliers

Identity management is something that must be built into every project, whether internal or external. That means the people who develop in-house custom applications for you must understand what identity management is conceptually, and how your company is implementing it from a practical perspective. You want your developers to be leveraging that consolidated infrastructure, not building yet another repository of identity data.

The same goes for your suppliers and partners. Be clear that you expect their software to work within your identity management paradigm. You may not be 100-percent successful with your suppliers and partners, but you need to insist that identity management be part of their solutions. If more of us do this, we will see more independent software vendors (ISVs) start to support external directories or application programming interfaces (APIs) for authentication and authorization rather than requiring their own.

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identity management, Quest Software

Quest on Compliance

Two of the product managers on my team (Tri Nguyen and Lance Masten) recently produced a podcast that discusses regulatory IT compliance issues and how Quest products can help solve these problems. So listen up if you've got any grey hair from worrying about compliance.

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Quest Software, compliance

Quest wins Best of TechEd 2007 Award

I don't have all the details but Quest Software won 1st prize in the SharePoint category of the "Best of TechEd 2007" awards. We won the prize for our "Site Administrator for SharePoint" product:

Site Administrator for SharePoint helps organizations reduce risk and gain control of SharePoint 2003 or 2007 with tools that provide discovery, site and content browsing, data collection and reporting, and global policy management to assist IT in managing one of their most critical business information platforms.

Congrats to Dave Waugh, Doug Davis, Amy Marshall and all the developers on our SharePoint team.

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Quest Software, SharePoint

Microsoft agrees to participate in ID project

Todd Bishop of the Seattle P-I published an interesting article about further Microsoft interop efforts this morning...

With the CardSpace system in Windows Vista, Microsoft is one of many companies working on new online identification systems. However, Microsoft has so far refrained from joining the Liberty Alliance, an industry consortium formed in part out of concerns over the company's original Passport log-in system.

But Microsoft has now agreed to participate in an upcoming meeting of the Concordia Project, which was conceived by the Liberty Alliance to be an independent group that encourages interoperability among business-related identity systems. The group announced this morning that Mike Jones of Microsoft's CardSpace team will take part in the meeting along with OpenID and Liberty Alliance representatives. According to the Concordia site, they will listen to case studies from AOL, Boeing and others, and then use those case studies to help figure out how to proceed.

The move follows Microsoft's embrace of OpenID earlier this year, which suggested a more inclusive approach.

I'm sure Kim Cameron is behind this in a few ways but it is further positive reinforcement of Microsoft's efforts to be open and interoperable. I'm happy to see it.

Apparently AOL and Boeing will be participating. If you read the whole article you'll see how Roger Sullivan of the Liberty Alliance talks about wanting an open forum to hear about customer use cases and better understand what customers need around business federation. Here, here! Great idea!

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federation, CardSpace, Kim Cameron, Microsoft

Tenet #6 - Beware of YAD or YA Anything

Here's tenet #6 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Beware of YAD or YA Anything

You will probably be talking to many identity management vendors as part of your purchasing process either in the request for information (RFI) or request for proposal (RFP) phase of your project. Beware of any vendor that requires you to purchase yet another directory (YAD) or yet another (YA) anything. Remember, a complicated environment with many moving parts is what got you here in the first place. If a vendor says you need to purchase its directory or a component that you already have from another vendor, start asking some serious questions. If you are being asked to purchase another directory, ask why. Ask whether and how other directories will be consolidated through that purchase. If consolidation is not occurring, you will be left with synchronizing yet another directory, which means more moving parts and that you aren’t simplifying. Be very careful about adding additional infrastructure. You may end up being forced into an additional directory but be sure you clearly understand the reasons and any alternatives or trade-offs.

The same is true for other components. If you are happy with your reporting system, but are being asked to replace it, exercise caution. Consolidation means reducing the number of moving parts, not replacing them one for one. Make sure that you are getting additional benefit and you are reducing the number of products and tools in use as much as possible.

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identity management, Quest Software

Tenet #5 - Concentrate on Immediate and Near-term ROI Benefits

Here's tenet #5 from my whitepaper "Tenets of Identity Management". Part #1 of the "Tenets of Identity Management" podcast is posted on the Quest web site. Part #2 is also now available.

Concentrate on Immediate and Near-term ROI Benefits

Too many identity management projects have failed because they took too long to deliver benefits or the benefits they delivered weren’t leveraged. It is key that you prioritize delivering significant end-user benefits as quickly as possible so you can show immediate progress and benefit to your management. Determine which part of your project will benefit your end-user population the most and implement that first. Not only will your company start seeing immediate return-on-investment (ROI), but the projects (and you) will be seen as "on the road to success". This will help eliminate or alleviate both political and funding issues.

Generally, the best area to concentrate on for immediate or near-term ROI is self service. Self service can be highly leveraged if you can significantly reduce or eliminate some of the end-user pains and the associated help desk costs regarding password management, password reset, group management or identity data updates (e.g., mobile phone number and work address). Another area to consider that is not as leveraged but is highly valuable is regulatory (e.g., SOX, GLB, HIPAA) compliance reporting. If your identity management project can provide specific regulatory reports that are more comprehensive or delivered faster than before, your company can benefit significantly. This will also provide great exposure to, and support of, your senior executives.

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identity management, Quest Software

ADFS "2"?

SVR 224 - Microsoft's Identity and Access Strategy For IT Professionals

Pete Houston gave this presentation today. Not a lot of new news but a few tidbits:

ILM "2", due out in 2H08, will include integration with Office 2007 so users can create groups and distribution lists via Outlook. Pete also mentioned how support in ILM "2" would be extended to downlevel clients which I took to mean IE-based and SharePoint.

He also talked about ADFS "2" which was the first time I've heard about it. It was listed with a tbd ("Longhorn Wave") release date. Key featues include new setup and stronger administrator controls. Anyone who has tried to setup ADFS knows how much the administrative interfaces suck so any improvement here will be good. I also liked the fact that RMS (Rights Management Server) will be federated so cross-company collaboration will be possible although I'm not sure how easy it will be.

One other interesting note was that BMC's name was still littered across Pete's slide deck as a key partner despite recent news: "End of BMC’s .Net Identity Management suite highlights stink with Microsoft, partners". So I'm not quite sure what that's all about. I was quite happy to see Quest Software listed as a partner in all the right places so thanks for that, Pete!

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Microsoft, Active Directory Federation Services, identity management, Quest Software

Off to TechEd

I'm off to Microsoft TechEd in Orlando this week. I'll blog about whatever interesting identity management, Active Directory sessions or related exhibits I run across. The highlight for me will be the customer appreciation dinner Quest will be hosting one evening next week. More on that, and TechEd, later...


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Quest Software, Microsoft, identity management, Active Directory

FTTP? FiOS? part #2

In February I blogged about how Verizon was getting ready to install "fiber to the premises" or FTTP and the ensuing conversation with my wife on that topic. Fast forward to Thursday of this past week (5/31/07) and Tetra Tech, the subcontractor for Verizon, is actually pulling the fiber-optic cables throughout the neighborhood. Click on the picture below to see a few of the shots I took of the operation. It took a long time for the conduits to be installed but laying the fiber was fast.

FiOS fibre install

Of course, my wife "caught" me taking pictures of the operation. Here's a recap of the conversation...

• Wife: What are you taking pictures of?


• Jackson: Those guys that are working outside.


• Wife: Why? What do we need pictures of that for?


• Jackson: For my blog.


• Wife: You and your blog. Now you're blogging about workmen?


• Jackson: No, it's about the Verizon fibre optic stuff we talked about before. Remember? High-speed interest, TV and IP phone service.


• Wife: So you're going to get it?


• Jackson: Yes, it's cheaper and faster than what we have now.


• Wife: Sure, it'll be cheaper for a few months then they'll raise the rates. You're in marketing and I can't believe you're falling for their line.


• Jackson: I don't think that will happen. This is all about competition and stealing market share from ComCast. They have to keep it cheaper.


• Wife: Right. Sure. Just make sure they don't make a mess because I'm sure you're going to tell me they have to drill and install stuff in the house next, right?


• Jackson: Ah......

Stay tuned for part #3 when Verizon actually installs the service. There will be more pictures, an after-action report on the service and probably another dialog with my wife about the whole thing.

Unless I can get it all done while she's out of town...