Calling all--

* telecom managers

* datacom managers with voice responsibilities

* Call Center managers

* VoIP implementers

* network integrators

* product and service developers

* industry analysts

Clear and precise analysis and discussion of PBX system design and capabilities. Allan Sulkin has a unique ability to explain complex systems in easily understandable terms. -- Joe Licata, President, Siemens Enterprise Networks

A welcome addition to the bookshelf for anyone interested in the evolving IP-PBX system. Voice and data communications managers alike will greatly benefit from this text. -- Michael Thurk, Avaya, Group Vice President - Systems

Allan Sulkins solid expertise and critical insight has been a valuable resource for the telecommunications community for over 20 years. He is uniquely qualified to articulate the very complex subject of PBX and IP telephony. -- Kanji Suzuki, former EVP of NEC America and current president and CEO of NEC Infrontia, Inc.

The most efficient (and economical) ways to bring enterprise communication systems into the Digital Age are in this guide, written by the foremost analyst in the markret space. In PBX Systems for IP Telephony, Allan Sulkin--consultant and advisor to Avaya, Siemens, Cisco, NEC, Alcatel and other world-class companies--evaluates technologies, markets, and best practices for enterprise voice systems, messaging, and customer contact centers.

The heart and brains of your communications network, the PBX (Private Branch Exchange) can be the vital link--or the missing link--that interfaces businesses and their customers. This guide, from the recognized expert in telephony systems, provides answers. Whether you need to IP-enable a PBX system for a small business, make complex choices for the advanced call center, or gain the expertise to integrate a variety of communication systems into a state-of-the-art foundation for your e-business vision, PBX Systems for IP Telephony should be your first choice. Heres why:

* No one knows PBX systems and markets better than the author, and no one is better at explaining them

* This comprehensive resource supplies nuts-and-bolts information on costs, performance, risks, and other real-world considerations difficult to research

* You get insights into the potential strengths and weaknesses of next-generation PBX systems

* Youll consult the consultant to the system designers for practical advice on systems that fit your needs and your future

* Theres no more business-aware or user-friendly guide anywhere to converging your voice systems with your IP-based data systems

When it comes to the PBX, the question often seems to be Whos job is it anyway? With this guidebook, youll be ready to take the responsibility--and get the credit.

Providing video companionship for isolated housewives, afternoon babysitting for children, and nonstop evening entertainment for the whole family, television revolutionized American society in the post-World War II years. Helping the first TV generation make sense of the new medium was the mission of Jack Gould, television critic of The New York Times from 1947 to 1972. In columns noteworthy for crisp writing, pointed insights, and fair judgment, he highlighted both the untapped possibilities and the imminent perils of television, becoming "the conscience of the industry" for many people.

In this book, historian Lewis L. Gould, Jack Gould's son, collects over seventy of his father's best columns. Grouped topically, they cover a wide range of issues, including the Golden Age of television drama, McCarthy-era blacklisting, the rise and fall of Edward R. Murrow, quiz show scandals, children's programming, and the impact of television on American life and of television criticism on the medium itself. Lewis Gould also supplies a brief biography of his father that assesses his influence on the evolution of television, as well as prefaces to each section.

Offering a deeper understanding of today’s internet media and the management theory behind it Platforms are everywhere. From social media to chat, streaming, credit cards, and even bookstores, it seems like almost everything can be described as a platform. In The Platform Economy, Marc Steinberg argues that the “platformization� of capitalism has transformed everything, and it is imperative that we have a historically precise, robust understanding of this widespread concept.  Taking Japan as the key site for global platformization, Steinberg delves into that nation’s unique technological and managerial trajectory, in the process systematically examining every facet of the elusive word platform. Among the untold stories revealed here is that of the 1999 iPhone precursor, the i-mode: the world’s first widespread mobile internet platform, which became a blueprint for Apple and Google’s later dominance of the mobile market. Steinberg also charts the rise of social gaming giants GREE and Mobage, chat tools KakaoTalk, WeChat, and LINE, and video streaming site Niconico Video, as well as the development of platform theory in Japan, as part of a wider transformation of managerial theory to account for platforms as mediators of cultural life.  Analyzing platforms’ immense impact on contemporary media such as video streaming, music, and gaming, The Platform Economy fills in neglected parts of the platform story. In narrating the rise and fall of Japanese platforms, and the enduring legacy of Japanese platform theory, this book sheds light on contemporary tech titans like Facebook, Google, Apple, and Netflix, and their platform-mediated transformation of contemporary life—it is essential reading for anyone wanting to understand what capitalism is today and where it is headed.

"This book is a collection of articles, written by both academics and practitioners as an evidence base for citizen engagement through information and communication technologies (ICTs). In it, the authors ask: how do ICTs empower through participation, transparency and accountability? Specifically, the authors examine two principal questions: Are technologies an accelerator to closing the "accountability gap" - the space between the supply (governments, service providers) and demand (citizens, communities, civil society organizations or CSOs) that requires bridging for open and collaborative governance? And under what conditions does this occur? The introductory chapters lay the theoretical groundwork for understanding the potential of technologies to achieving intended goals. Chapter 1 takes us through the theoretical linkages between empowerment, participation, transparency and accountability. In Chapter 2, the authors devise an informational capability framework, relating human abilities and well-being to the use of ICTs. The chapters to follow highlight practical examples that operationalize ICT-led initiatives. Chapter 3 reviews a sample of projects targeting the goals of transparency and accountability in governance to make preliminary conclusions around what evidence exists to date, and where to go from here. In chapter 4, the author reviews the process of interactive community mapping (ICM) with examples that support general local development and others that mitigate natural disasters. Chapter 5 examines crowdsourcing in fragile states to track aid flows, report on incitement or organize grassroots movements. In chapter 6, the author reviews Check My School (CMS), a community monitoring project in the Philippines designed to track the provision of services in public schools. Chapter 7 introduces four key ICT-led, citizen-governance initiatives in primary health care in Karnataka, India. Chapter 8 analyzes the World Bank Institute's use of ICTs in expanding citizen project input to understand the extent to which technologies can either engender a new "feedback loop" or ameliorate a "broken loop." The authors' analysis of the evidence signals ICTs as an accelerator to closing the "accountability gap." In Chapter 9, the authors conclude with the Loch Ness model to illustrate how technologies contribute to shrinking the gap, why the gap remains open in many cases, and what can be done to help close it. This collection is a critical addition to existing literature on ICTs and citizen engagement for two main reasons: first, it is expansive, covering initiatives that leverage a wide range of technology tools, from mobile phone reporting to crowdsourcing to interactive mapping; second, it is the first of its kind to offer concrete recommendations on how to close feedback loops."

The message of this book is simple: the mobile phone strengthens social bonds among family and friends. With a traditional land-line telephone, we place calls to a location and ask hopefully if someone is "there"; with a mobile phone, we have instant and perpetual access to friends and family regardless of where they are. But when we are engaged in these intimate conversations with absent friends, what happens to our relationship with the people who are actually in the same room with us? In New Tech, New Ties, Rich Ling examines how the mobile telephone affects both kinds of interactions--those mediated by mobile communication and those that are face to face. Ling finds that through the use of various social rituals the mobile telephone strengthens social ties within the circle of friends and family--sometimes at the expense of interaction with those who are physically present--and creates what he calls "bounded solidarity." Ling argues that mobile communication helps to engender and develop social cohesion within the family and the peer group. Drawing on the work of Emile Durkheim, Erving Goffman, and Randall Collins, Ling shows that ritual interaction is a catalyst for the development of social bonding. From this perspective, he examines how mobile communication affects face-to-face ritual situations and how ritual is used in interaction mediated by mobile communication. He looks at the evidence, including interviews and observations from around the world, that documents the effect of mobile communication on social bonding and also examines some of the other possibly problematic issues raised by tighter social cohesion in small groups.Rich Ling is Senior Researcher at the Norwegian telecommunications company Telenor and Adjunct Research Scientist at the University of Michigan. He is the author of The Mobile Connection: The Cell Phone's Impact on Society.