#CTS12 – day 1 coverage

I thought it would be useful to link to various stories with coverage of the first day of The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit.

It was a great launch with a wonderful array of diverse and dynamic speakers, topical areas of discussion and an energized audience.

There are two more days to go; Tuesday includes an address by Industry Minister Christian Paradis.

It’s showtime

It isn’t dancing cats, but I like this video anyway.

This is what will be on the signboard at The Toronto Congress Centre to greet delegates for The Canadian Telecom Summit from June 4-6.

As this posting goes live, we are starting our move into the Congress Centre to be ready for everyone to arrive on Monday. Early next week, the Canadian Telecom industry gathers for the 11th annual Canadian Telecom Summit, which opens Monday.

We hope you will join us – but please register in advance in order to avoid being disappointed.

A number of companies and industry leaders are speaking at the event for the first time. Others are familiar faces.

We do our best to keep the sessions fresh and relevant.

For many, The Canadian Telecom Summit is a chance to meet with colleagues, suppliers and clients to connect and to do business.

There is a trade delegation from Austria joining us this year and we have delegates attending from every province and territory, as well as Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

I hope you will be with us in person. You can teleconference all you want, but there is nothing yet that replaces face-to-face encounters, whether meeting officially or just casually meeting while waiting for the barista to finish pouring your double-shot 2% latte – no sugar, thanks. Ièm sweet enough.

Through the years, these chance meetings have been invaluable for many of our regular delegates. Sometimes, you donèt even know who you needed to meet, until after you met them. As an aside, there is an important message in there for the people who drafted our soon-to-be proclaimed, e-commerce inhibiting anti-spam laws. But I won’t get into that now – maybe over a drink on Monday evening at the cocktail reception.

Follow the event on Twitter using #CTS12. I will try to post links to some of the news coverage from the event.

 

There’s an app for that

There is a mobile app for The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit.

Thanks to our Mobile Solutions partner, Tech Mahindra, this year’s event offers a way for delegates to connect with each other and participate using mobile devices.

The app is available for Android, Blackberry and iOS platforms.

To make use of the app, go to the registration page, set up an account and set the amount of information that you want to share with other participants at the event. You will receive an email with follow-up login instructions.

Tech Mahindra will have a help desk on site.

The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit opens on Monday (June 4). Have you registered yet?

Will you join us next week?

Will you be with some of the most influential leaders of the Canadian & International ICT industry who are gathering next week at The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit?

No other event matches The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit for the depth and breadth of topics covered and issues debated. No other event presents a complete picture of current and expected trends & developments. Come see why The Canadian Telecom Summit has become Canada’s must-attend conference.

With more opportunities than ever to learn, network and do business, if you are involved with or impacted by Canadian telecommunications, broadcasting and information technology, you need to be at The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit.

Join your colleagues for 3 days of spirited discussion and networking, next (June 4-6, 2012) at the Toronto Congress Centre.

Register today for The 2012 Canadian Telecom Summit.

For the complete conference agenda, visit http://www.telecomsummit.com – you can download the conference brochure here.

Be sure to mark the dates for next year in your calendar: June 3-5, 2013.

Improving streetscapes

Vancouver introduced a novel modular utility pole at the New Cities Summit in Paris last week. According to the story in the National Post:

To clear its streets of cellphone towers, parking meters, Wi-Fi terminals, streetlights and even community message boards, the city of Vancouver is pushing forward with a scheme to compress all the technologies together into specialized “Vancouver poles” planted throughout the city.

I have been participating in a task force to help my local community develop a telecommunications infrastructure protocol for dealing with carrier requests for local land use consent. I have been supporting an idea for for the city to leverage its existing vertical real estate, including poles, towers and buildings. As wireless carriers expand their networks for capacity (as opposed to coverage), tower height requirements are reduced; can more of the carrier needs be integrated into replacements for existing lighting, traffic and electric poles?

“We’ve been seeing an almost exponentially growing demand for data,” said Mr. Johnston. “So, we’ve been trying to find a way to integrate cell phone infrastructure into the urban landscape in a way that does not detract from the aesthetic and view qualities of the city.”

As wireless traffic climbs — and infrastructure expands in response — Mr. Coupland predicts that poorly-managed cities could become “as cluttered as a kitchen junk drawer.” “I like to get rid of as much crap as possible from the visual environment,” he said.

Is there an opportunity for cities to develop partnerships with wireless carriers to develop a next generation streetscape, with new energy efficient lighting, reducing clutter while delivering more reliable and diverse competitive wireless coverage?

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