During my Goal Setting webinars I often talk about the WHY. That goals only work if we have a reason (or we only work our goals if we have a big enough reason), a burning desire to see that goal through.

“WHY is that important to me? What will I have that I don’t have now when I make this happen?

“According to Heidi Grant Halvorson, author of Succeed, the best way to achieve your sales goal is to know WHY you’re doing it.”

Jill Konrath has a short video about this.

An interesting quote to end the year by Nicholas Bate:

A fresh start requires fresh goals;
Fresh goals require fresh thinking;
Fresh thinking requires letting go and looking forward.

Jeff Kagan is an analyst in Atlanta that gave a dire warning to Windstream’s Board of Directors in 2010. Mainly he talks about cresting waves – like wireline, POTS, DSL. What wave will WIND or YOU ride in 2015 and to come?

Many FISPA members have already changed from resale to owning infrastructure. More and more CLECs and WISPs are turning to fiber assets (for many reasons).

BTW, Google commented to the FCC about Title II classification. “Google this week told the FCC that reclassifying broadband providers under Title II of the Telecommunications Act would have a big side benefit for Google Fiber because it would give Google Fiber the same access to utility poles and other key infrastructure currently enjoyed by Comcast, AT&T and other big-name ISPs.” I don’t know how accurate that is (or if CLEC status would solve some of their issues) but it carries some weight at the FCC.

Fred Wilson, the venture capitalist in NYC, noted that “Xiaomi will spend some of the $1.1bn they just raised coming to the US. This will bring a strong player in the non-google android sector into the US market and legitimize a “third mobile OS” in the western world. The good news for developers is developing for non-google android is not much different than developing for google android.”

What I would take from that is that mobility, apps, IM/chat and other UC components are still open for competition. That if Hosted PBX is the wave that you are riding, then you need to figure out how to own the mobile space for some of those activities. If not, you will be replaced or relegated to POTS replacement.

Wilson also says, “More asian penetration into the US market will come from the messenger sector as both Line and WeChat make strong moves to gain a share of the lucrative US messenger market.” He is bullish on SAAS and Cybersecurity.

Good luck in 2015. See you in Miami at ITEXPO on Jan. 25-29 and in New Orleans at FISPA Live on Feb. 2-4.

PanTerra Networks has announced its Unified Business Analytics offering for the mid-market, available via channel partners. The solution combines unified communications (UC) analytics with content management analytics to monitor, react to and adjust business processes in real-time to make them more efficient and competitive. [CVX]

Atlantic Tele-Network (ATN) is expanding into a new business: it has acquired commercial distributed generation solar power company Green Lake Capital, for $103 million. It will form a new subsidiary, Ahana, based in San Francisco, which will operate 28 commercial solar projects at 59 sites with an aggregate 45.7 megawatts of electricity generating capacity. [CVX]

Parallels SMB Cloud Insights survey 2014 is available. It is a good read if you want to know where the puck is in cloud and web apps.

The breach reports for 2014 are out — from Verizon and the ID Theft Center. I think security will be a central topic again in 2015 (read more here).

Happy New Year (and thanks for reading)

Plus one very different Hosted UC promo:

The FCC released a Report and Order, increasing the E-rate spending cap from $2.4 billion to $3.9 billion.  Thus, the FCC announced
the proposed universal service contribution factor for the first
quarter of 2015 will be 16.8 percent, up from the previous 16.1
percent.   16.8% for USF

BTW, soon USF will be on more than just LD:  NTCA urged the FCC to expand the USF contribution base to include broadband Internet access and non-interconnected VoIP services.

Chairman Wheeler sent letters to Congress on open Internet issues. Verizon filed a letter
asserting recent ex partes urging the FCC to adopt a rule in the open
Internet proceeding that would regulate inter-connection agreements for
the exchange of Internet traffic, including those relating to entry
points to last-mile networks, are misplaced and wrong. Free Press discussed application of open Internet rules to mobile wireless services.

VZ also told its stakeholders that the FCC does NOT have the authority to regulate inter-connection or peering.  Verizon Urges FCC to Reaffirm Broadband Internet Access is an Information Service

The Rural Broadband Alliance announced on December 22, 2014, Harold Furchtgott-Roth and Kathleen Wallman released a white paper entitled An
Assessment of the Operational and Financial Health Of Rate-of-Return
Telecommunications Companies in More Than 700 Study Areas: 2007-2012.
The study concluded the operational and financial health of the rural
rate-of-return industry has been declining since 2007, and that the
decline was more markedly adverse in the period 2011-2012 following
implementation of the Transformation Order. The study is based on an
analysis of data examining 705 rural rate-of-return carrier study areas,
and is based on publicly available data maintained by NECA. RBA said
the data demonstrate that investment by small rural rate-of-return
carriers slowed significantly after the release of the
2011Transformation Order. The study was partially underwritten by a
grant from the RBA.  [They needed a study for this???]

The FCC is also looking at changing the definition of term multi-channel video programming distributor (MVPD) by including within its scope services that make available for purchase, by subscribers or customers, multiple linear streams of video programming, regardless of the technology used to distribute the programming.  In other words, Netflix, Aereo and other OTT could be considered MSOs.  [story here]

The FCC also changed the definition of Broadband.  “The Federal Communications Commission has raised minimum download speeds
to 10 Mbps for any broadband companies that want to get funds from the
government’s 4-year-old Connect America program to install and maintain
broadband services in rural parts of the United States.” [NECA] [story here]  This will change the stats on who gets broaddband, since 10MB down is tough for DSL or Fixed wireless in many cases.

I am from Connecticut, a state that AT&T grew frustrated with and sold to Frontier. Frontier took over the telecom infrastructure and POOF! Calamity struck. Frontier DSL has a reputation for being weak. Now in CT too. 46 cities are pushing to make CT a Gigabit state.

The FCC, states, Congress and the Duopoly fought over muni networks this year. In many states, it is now illegal. The thing is there wouldn’t be a clamor for Muni networks if there was a competitive environment. But there isn’t. Cable and telco hardly compete. And many regions have a single provider (read: monopoly). Or you have a state with at least one of the duopoly with an out-dated network. And where are the third parties?

The FCC worked on CAF experiments, E-Rate changes, USF Reform and other elements to bridge the Digital Divide this year. More fees to pay for a bigger USF budget in 2015.

One thought: the US economy spins on the Internet.

“While net neutrality captured Washington policy headlines, the most significant communications development in 2014 was the emergence of new and more viable approaches to building community and municipal Gigabit Networks. … This year’s fight over net neutrality is not unrelated to the push for Gigabit Networks. The Federal Communications Commission’s Open Internet proceeding is a battle over scarcity: The prioritization of traffic on lower-capacity networks.” Article by Drew Clark.

It isn’t that I am pro-Muni. It is that I think there needs to be a third entity to push the Duopoly to supply the broadband network that we not only need and want but in many cases HAVE PAID FOR!

More on the CT Gigabit private/public idea here.