Volume 17, Issue 25 — July 10, 2019

RavePro — Volume 17, Issue 25 — July 10, 2019

July 10, 2019 | Volume: 17 | Issue: 25

Oh, standards. Today Dr. Fred Ampel stands on his soapbox and rants a bit about standards in the industry, with his amusingly-titled column, Is It a Standard If Nobody Uses It? I recently wrote and compiled a lengthy standards guideline document for advertising in digital signage (DOOH), so I feel his pain. (Read it here! It’s totally free!) But I did appreciate the opportunity to use my favorite xkcd comic. You’re welcome, fellow nerds.

Speaking of Dr. Ampel, he also very nicely asked if I would tell everyone about his upcoming webinar on July 24th about how to sell to houses of worship. So here it goes: It’s free! You should watch it! He’ll help you find HOW decision makers and navigate the nuances of this unique vertical. Register here.

And it wouldn’t be a rAVe introduction if I didn’t tell you to go check out some of our trade show coverage. Our InfoComm 2019 coverage is here.

-Sara Abrons

COLUMNS

+ Is It a Standard if Nobody Uses it? [Dr. Frederick Ampel]

The AV/IT industry has a problem, one of its own making and one that is getting worse by the micro-second. There are just too many conflicting and confusing “standards” and best practices. Between those created by trade groups, those developed by technical associations or technology consortia (worse yet as these tend to be proprietary) and the flavor variations created by various international overlays on existing standards, the pile of paper is beginning to reach the size of a major mountain range in height.

+ Building Resilience Into Your Schedule [Lee Distad]

I’d say that the sheer number of aphorisms devoted to problems is a testament to how important it is to do your best to prepare for them in advance, in order to minimize their impact. As it was explained to me a long time ago, professionalism isn’t about not having problems; you’re always going to have problems. Instead, professionalism is about how you overcome those problems.