User groups: Why it matters that your voice is heard

Insightful analysis by consultants Steve Taylor and Jim Metzler, plus links to the latest WAN news headlines

Following up yet again on user groups and their impact on the telecommunications environment, today we'd like to share a couple more comments. In particular, Jim Blaszak, an attorney at Levine, Blaszak, Block & Boothby wrote about the Ad Hoc Telecommunications Users Committee, of which he is counsel.

Blaszak said that Ad Hoc is a group of about 20 large companies from a broad range of industry sectors, including financial services, manufacturing, insurance, retail, accounting and consulting, transportation, and information services. "What the members all have in common is that they are IT and telecom-intensive companies - they spend enough money in both areas to care about keeping prices as low as possible. Ad Hoc accepts no carrier/vendor funding and no telecom service providers as members. Maintaining its independence is critically important because Ad Hoc's principal reason for being is the representation of its members' interests in regulatory matters pending before government agencies and the courts," he wrote.

He noted that Ad Hoc's interests and positions often diverge from those of carriers and vendors. "As the only end user group that digs into these issues on a consistent, long-term basis, Ad Hoc has had a huge impact over the last 25 years on the FCC rules that push IT and telecom prices down," he said.

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Following up yet again on user groups and their impact on the telecommunications environment, today we'd like to share a couple more comments. In particular, Jim Blaszak, an attorney at Levine, Blaszak, Block & Boothby wrote about the Ad Hoc Telecommunications Users Committee, of which he is counsel.

Blaszak said that Ad Hoc is a group of about 20 large companies from a broad range of industry sectors, including financial services, manufacturing, insurance, retail, accounting and consulting, transportation, and information services. "What the members all have in common is that they are IT and telecom-intensive companies - they spend enough money in both areas to care about keeping prices as low as possible. Ad Hoc accepts no carrier/vendor funding and no telecom service providers as members. Maintaining its independence is critically important because Ad Hoc's principal reason for being is the representation of its members' interests in regulatory matters pending before government agencies and the courts," he wrote.

He noted that Ad Hoc's interests and positions often diverge from those of carriers and vendors. "As the only end user group that digs into these issues on a consistent, long-term basis, Ad Hoc has had a huge impact over the last 25 years on the FCC rules that push IT and telecom prices down," he said.

He said that due to the numerous activities of the group, "Ad Hoc members have invaluable advance information for making their deployment and procurement decisions. Enterprise users who don't have this information proceed at their own peril. Finally, the group is a great learning and networking opportunity for member company representatives."

To learn more about Ad Hoc, you can e-mail Blaszak, or Colleen Boothby, another attorney at Levine, Blaszak, Block & Boothby, who has represented Ad Hoc. "Thanks to Ad Hoc, enterprise customers still have a home and a voice in Washington," Blaszak said.
 
Nevertheless, not all readers agree that all is rosy, particularly when it comes to users having input for technical specifications and vendor product development. Our colleague Alan Weissberger wrote: "Telecom users groups seem to be a thing of the past. There are many promising new telecom technologies for the enterprise, e.g., carrier Ethernet, WiMAX (especially as a wireless tail circuit), QoS based IP VPNs, evolution to [next-generation networks], etc.  However, users are not at all involved in their standardization, providing requirements, or use cases/usage patterns to various fora, alliances, or standards organizations.

"How can network architectures be built and standards generated without user inputs - especially requirements and prioritization of features/ functions?"

Bottom line in our opinion?  The good news is that there is still some activity.  However, the industry will ultimately suffer significantly in the long-term if we - as users - don't make our collective voice heard.

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Steve Taylor is president of Distributed Networking Associates and publisher/editor-in-chief of Webtorials. Jim Metzler is vice president of Ashton, Metzler & Associates.