Insight Community

If you haven't noticed, we're starting an ongoing series of cases here to develop interesting, engaging and useful discussions for our new sub-site, IT Innovations.  We're looking for insights that might help IT managers stay informed and keep their operations competitive.  

So for this case's topic, we'd like to delve into the subject of picking a data center location. We're not too interested in lengthy narratives about horror stories in selecting a server farm back in 1998.  But that's not to say we don't want to hear your personal experiences.  We're just aiming more for concise, non-generic advice that might help your fellow IT gurus (or gurus in training).  A few hundred words should suffice.

If you're not exactly a writer, you could submit something like a mashed-up map for where data center locations are optimally located -- just as long as your contribution is relevant and useful.  A picture can be worth a thousand words -- and is sometimes more illustrative of a point.  

And this topic isn't restricted only to geographic factors.  There are likely a multitude of reasons for choosing a data center, and we'd like to hear what you think are some of the most important.  

If you haven't noticed, we're starting an ongoing series of cases here to develop interesting, engaging and useful discussions for our new sub-site, IT Innovations. We're looking for insights that might help IT managers stay informed and keep their operations competitive.

For this case, we're looking for engaging content and experts to be featured who can help educate IT decision makers on the management of mission-critical applications in datacenters.

The topics for this case will focus on datacenter management services and solutions. We're looking for at least 300 words in the form of a blog post that can serve as a discussion starter, and we'd also like to encourage commenting on the submitted insights. Appropriate topics for these discussions include:

• How do you effectively communicate datacenter priorities to non-technical managers?
• What datacenter management services can you not live without? How do you justify the costs?
• How do you assess datacenter priorities? Do you think there's a better way?
• How often do you review your datacenter management tools and compare them to alternative solutions?

These topics are not exhaustive, and you do not need to address all of these suggested conversations. We welcome additional proposals for alternative subjects, and if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask.

We are looking for engaging content and experts to be featured who can help educate IT decision makers on the management of mission-critical applications in datacenters.

The topics for this case will focus on application performance monitoring and testing. We're looking for at least 300 words in the form of a blog post that can serve as a discussion starter, and we'd also like to encourage commenting on the submitted insights. Appropriate topics for these discussions include:

• tips for datacenter managers on improving efficiency of existing resources and an overview of the methods to do so;
• a review of software tools and metrics for predicting future capacity and development;
• a compilation of the common risks and benefits of automating application monitoring and testing tools; and
• guidelines on the development of internal benchmarks to assess current performance and to set future performance goals.

These topics are not exhaustive, and you do not need to address all of these suggested conversations. We welcome additional proposals for alternative subjects, and if you have any questions, please do not hesitate to ask.

The usual economic indicators suggest things aren't getting worse as fast as before, and the more cautious forecasters are offering some less-than-optimistic predictions of a long road ahead for recovery. Several analysts (in reports from McKinsey Quarterly, Harvard Business Review and the like) point out that business has fundamentally changed and that the current downturn is not simply part of a regular business cycle. On the upside, though, the preceding decades have developed an incredible collection of enabling technologies that businesses may have only scratched the surface of -- which have laid the foundations for future long-term economic growth.

In this environment, employees look for real leadership and direction from their corporate executives. So this case sponsor, HP, is looking to inspire forward-looking discussions with essays aimed at executive level managers. We're looking for insightful articles that may help guide executives towards success during uncertain times. What does an executive need to do or need to know to be more effective nowadays? What does the future of business look like? How can an organization thrive under pressure? What innovative technologies or services will help companies stay competitive? What techniques can be used to motivate and promote innovation? How can workflows be optimized to be smarter, more efficient and productive? These are just some example starting topics to give you a general sense of what we're looking for -- we're not expecting point-by-point answers. We encourage unique (and even entertaining) submissions on related topics.

The best insights will be used as posts on an HP website that will be announced later. Please submit essays that are at least 500 words in length.

UPDATE: The sponsor is more accurately "HP Enterprise" -- so the target audience is specifically executives and decision makers (CEOs, CFOs, COOs, etc) at large companies.

The current economic situation has certainly reduced the financing prospects of a good number of big ideas, but that doesn't mean the development of innovative businesses and technologies should (or will) grind to a halt. Obviously, though, starting up during a boom is a bit different than bootstrapping during a recession. But that just means more garage startups get created in actual garages -- focused on creating truly valuable services and technology.

So what kind of big ideas are possible to develop during a recession? How can government help (or hinder) economic growth under the current financial conditions? What kinds of technology revolutions may be primed to go right now -- and what can help give them a boost? What areas of business are thriving currently and are poised to continue to grow even when the economy recovers? How do companies plan for long-term growth and avoid pessimistic short-term thinking?

Microsoft People Ready Business is sponsoring this case to create interesting discussions at BigThink's section on Navigating Today's Economy. We're looking for unique perspectives that will inspire further conversations, and selected insights will be published on BigThink.com.

The business of print has always been a risky one. While the printing press made it much cheaper to print, there were still significant fixed costs involved. In order to make it economically feasible to print something, you had to make sure there were enough buyers, which involved significant forecasting. There were also significant costs associated with setting up each print run, such that it wasn't economically reasonable to do really custom work. Thankfully, in the past few decades advances in various technologies have made it cheaper and cheaper -- even as the rise of the internet has led many to write off the opportunities for print publishing, and even suggest that paper was dying.

Yet, what if that same trends, of ever decreasing technology costs combined with increasing quality and internet connectivity, enable a new era of print? These trends have the ability to enable things that simply couldn't be done before. We're seeing the beginnings of this with print-on-demand and self-publishing services, but where does it go from here? How far will these technology trends take us in creating totally new opportunities for print? When it's easy and cost effective to not just self-publish, but *micro-publish* suddenly the entire stream of possibilities becomes different. A photographer can publish a special magazine for every attendee at a wedding (even with the attendee's photo customized to be on the front). Or a novelist can let fans buy each chapter to be delivered fresh each month (or week!) as she finishes it. A textbook maker can create a totally customizable textbook, listing out a series of chapters online, allowing professors/teachers/students to create their own combination based on what works best for them.

And those are just a few starter ideas. HP is sponsoring this conversation (with more info at futureofprint.com) about how these trends will enable all sorts of new possibilities and business models. What new opportunities will be enabled thanks to ever cheaper print-on-demand offerings that combine customization, high quality and the connectivity of the internet? What new businesses may spring out of this convergence? What new hobbies, side projects, cultural artifacts? We're looking for creative thinking on where these trends will take us and what they'll enable.

Continuing our string of useful conversations, Register.com is sponsoring a series of discussions at the Insight Community concerning the development of a web presence by small business owners. Selected insights generated here will be featured on Register.com's Learning Center to benefit beginners in the small business community who are looking to build robust online websites.

For this first case, we're looking for recommendations on how business owners and entrepreneurs can get started with their efforts to expand their business online. Given the maturity of online advertising and the internet as a communication channel for customer service, how can small businesses take advantage of email, websites and web services to acquire new customers or increase customer loyalty? What metrics should a small business monitor to judge its online efforts? What kind of expertise does a business need to create a long-term online plan?

These are not the only questions to answer, but merely a sampling of some interesting topics. When submitting your contribution, avoid simply answering the questions listed here and develop your own unique insights for an approximately 200-500 word article that a small business audience would find interesting and enlightening.

Selected insights from this case will be re-published on Register.com's small business resource website, and the goal is to create a collection of educational articles aimed at a non-technical audience.

Intel and IBM would like to get the Insight Community's thoughts on what virtualization (in the IT context) means to you.  

They will be hosting the best thoughts on this subject on their new site, Virtualization Conversation.

Pick ONE of the following topics and expand on it to discuss your views on the subject in approximately 750 to 1,500 words.

• Maximizing the business value of data centers
• Virtualization benchmarks
• The benefits of virtualization
• Improving efficiencies in the work environment

We're looking for views from folks in the IT world, giving some insight into their real world experiences on these topics. Eight Three responses will be chosen and placed on the Virtualization Conversation site.

Update: Intel and IBM were so pleased with the quality of responses, that they have increased the number of insights that they would like to use from three to eight.  Thanks everyone for your excellent insights!

LetsTalk's PhoneTalk blog wants to add new voices to its website, and they're posting regular Cases here for the Insight Community to add interesting new content to their site. The winning submissions for each Challenge Case will be posted (perhaps with some editing) on the PhoneTalk blog -- with credits to the author. The following is LetsTalk's next assignment:

Talking loudly on a cell phone in public is pretty much universally frowned upon. There have been plenty of attempts to ban mobile phones in classrooms and theaters, but is there a better way to let phone users know when it's not appropriate to use their phones? Are there technological solutions that would help? What do you think of subvocal microphones or software that would prevent dangerous or impolite phone use? What kind of etiquette rules would you suggest for various locations? How could these rules best be enforced?