As much as I hated writing that headline, it’s true. And, despite years of warnings that the future of the cineplex was nothing but apocalyptic, Hollywood wasn’t prepared. Let’s back-up. Back in the late ’90s, companies started building DVD servers for home theaters. The idea was that a homeowner could buy a cache of DVDs […]

There’s no doubt the audiovisual industry has progressed a long way since the advent of the gramophone and cathode-ray tube. Innovations over the last 50 to 100 years have turned AV devices into the primary content-delivery system for almost every human on Earth, and definitely a requirement for every human not on Earth. These innovations […]

Meet the company behind the new ticker symbol “CYVIZ.” Norway’s Cyviz goes to the Oslo Børs to secure a Euronext Growth listing, selling shares at NOK 34.50 (34 euros) and reaching a market capitalization of NOK 370 million (37 million euros). Cyviz designs, develops and delivers software and hardware solutions for conference rooms, control rooms […]

Great salespeople are like ducks, paddling furiously under the water while appearing calm to the outside world. Think about what our great salespeople go through with every prospective customer (budget, authority, buying team, decision-makers, influencers, need, timeline, urgency, objectives, etc.) while focusing on the client’s needs. Sometimes we overlook the most basic and critical distinction […]

Over the past several months, authors on rAVe [PUBS], such as David Danto, have written about the future of the office. This has also been the speculation of newspapers and magazines as of late. In fact, the most recent edition of the Harvard Business Review has a cover story on the Work from Anywhere Future. […]

THIS IS A PROMOTED POST  Tired of the same ol’ online content? Miss in-person trade shows and live AV education? SDVoE hears your pain. Instead of sulking over it, the association responded with an idea. No live events in 2020 be darned! (Using our PG language here…) SDVoE’s idea materialized into a fun new project […]

The spotlight series is a wonderful way to connect with Insiders and that’s why I been doing it for the past years. I love to learn from them and read what makes them keep on going on. In case you missed the 2020 spotlight series, I have linked all the great people featured here so […]

If your church already offers different weekly services — one traditional and the other contemporary — how one approaches each is crucial to the continued growth of the church. Congregation members benefit by choosing which suits them best. When differentiating between each type of service, lighting is an extremely key place to start. In determining […]

AV integrators and HOW leaders are among the many of us that have been presented with extreme challenges since the onset of the pandemic. For the next four to five minutes of your time, I plan to share my thoughts with you on how the HOW market needs help, how HOW integrators should prioritize customer […]

By Patrick Montgomery Futuresource Consulting Apple’s November launch of the $99 HomePod Mini comes at a good time. As the smart speaker market starts to mature in key western markets such as the U.S. and U.K., it creates a direct competitor to devices from market leaders Amazon and Google, both of whom in recent months […]

It’s handy and useful to employ mental tools and rubrics to organize your life in an effort to be more efficient and productive. But it’s also important not to mistake the maps you’re reading for the territory itself. As useful as such things are, it’s possible to be blinkered by them, and cut yourself off […]

In my time as a project manager for users and integrators, I’ve supported many international projects. National projects inside my country — America — follow the practices and customs I know. When I oversee work done in other countries — even multiple countries at once — I have learned to look for specific gotchas. At […]

https://twitter.com/haircutfw/status/1327121387031498752?s=20 On Nov. 9, 2020, the United States Federal Trade Commission announced a pending settlement with Zoom Video Communications, Inc. According to FTC Matter/File Number: 192 3167, “Zoom Video Communications, Inc. will be required to implement a robust information security program to settle FTC allegations that the video conferencing provider engaged in a series of […]

It’s not every day that we get a brand new conference in the AV industry. Especially from industry-leading associations like AVIXA and the Digital Signage Federation (DSF). ESPECIALLY in a pandemic year. That’s why we were so excited for the debut of D=SIGN, which kicked off Tuesday on Day 1 with a flurry of fantastically […]

History’s first-ever D=SIGN: The Digital Signage Conference — an exciting new event created by AVIXA and the Digital Signage Federation (DSF) — began Tuesday. The two-day conference, delivered virtually this year,* was packed with products, education and networking for those in the digital signage industry: think AV integrators, retail/hospitality/healthcare/QSR operators, media and content professionals, and […]

One thing that’s become clear to me over the past several months is how critically important it is that each and every one of us stay engaged and involved through this tough time. Despite the promising vaccine news that’s been trickling out recently, we still have a long road to recovery. And how quickly we […]

THIS IS A PROMOTED POST This year has forced innovation globally. Throughout 2020, much of the creativity has appeared in problem-solving and in the interest of human interactions returning to “normal.” For example, a handful of companies are rapidly developing one of the world’s first totally synthetic vaccines to fight COVID-19. But, the innovation didn’t […]

I’ve worked at lots of companies where I was considered a leader even though I was not technically a manager.  Leadership is definitely a skill and role that transcends titles, age groups, gender identities and cultural backgrounds. Something strange, though, happens when you are elevated into the management hierarchy, and people may follow you because […]

I logged into rAVe today to write a completely different blog post about management and an analogy to cheer squads, but as I landed on the rAVe site here, I ran across an article by Daniel Shatzkes titled “Why You Should Hire an Acoustics Specialist at the Outset”. I wasn’t familiar with Daniel as a […]

Not long ago, while on LinkedIn, I had a brief but interesting exchange that made me stop and think. A seemingly innocuous post and an ensuing comment by a connection on the platform generated an internal dialogue that I’m not sure I’ve completely resolved. I share it here because it may not only have ramifications […]

Let’s face it, in March and April of this year, the best we could expect to deliver was very reactive. Unless you were already streaming services each weekend, it’s unlikely you had time to respond proactively to COVID. And, this summer, as states and countries started partially reopening, adding streaming via consumer platforms like Facebook, […]

Reflecting on the year, it’s been a scary but eye-opening but wild but exciting but exhausting but fun ride. On the events side, I thought surely, with everything that’s happened, we’d have fewer opportunities to learn and network this year while home. I was wrong. rAVe had the pleasure of hosting all the SYNNEX LAVNCH […]

THIS IS A PROMOTED POST By Paul Richards StreamGeeks Three years ago, a few team members and I decided to create the StreamGeeks. As camera experts, our goal was to use engaging technical content to educate and empower end users about livestreaming and video production technologies. What began as a fun, quasi experiment turned into […]

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, it’s been a tough year for lots of companies, and indeed entire sectors. When business is slow, we’ve all got an imperative to look for new opportunities. But you have to be smart about it. In the past, I’ve seen manufacturers or their distributors see declining […]

By Matthew Ledgerwood Futuresource Consulting Interactive Displays Market Insights, Analysis and Commentary Interactive display sales soared in Q3, with strong performances across the globe, according to the latest quarterly tracking report from Futuresource Consulting. “The market has well and truly bounced back,” said Colin Messenger, senior market analyst, Futuresource Consulting. “Particularly when we consider the […]

In the beginning of April and again in May, I wrote updates about the state of higher education for integrators, who may be wondering what their business model would look like for the rest of the year. Paradoxically, it seems like a lot has changed since then, and nothing has changed at all. We are […]

Seoul extends its “destination marketing” by being the first city to offer a virtual meetings platform for event organizers. In response to the COVID-19 era, Seoul Convention Bureau (SCB) launches the “Virtual Seoul Platform” to be used for holding MICE events in the digital world. According to the organization (and our own knowledge), this is […]

In my biweekly blog series, I am highlighting some of the incredible people who work for the Audio Video Industry. In this post, we are profiling Sharath Abraham. Here is a brief introduction. Sharath Abraham is working currently as Engineering Manager at AVI-SPL. 1. Describe your journey in the AV industry? How did it start? […]

Any salesperson will tell you: Everything is sales. Of course it is. Isn’t our life and our work about convincing people to see the value and take action toward a goal? We want to come together and put some money on the table. Invest some capital into the idea. That’s the only way ideas become […]

This year, traditional working environments changed overnight as everyone shifted from an office to their homes. However, my household has always been far from a traditional work environment. My husband, Cameron, is a professional race car driver. He’s had a pretty successful career over the last ten years. He’s won the Rolex 24 Hours of […]

THIS IS A PROMOTED POST  The infamous 2020 is the year of social distancing. Limited travel. Working from home. Dogs barking at the mailperson. Videoconferencing fatigue. No doubt, today, there’s a certain “art” to being present. How do you stay engaged in our current climate of 2D meetings and, er, less-than virtual meetings and events? […]

By David Danto Poly In the 1960s and 1970s, automotive advertisements talked about gas mileage, safety, handling, zero to sixty, etc. People purchased cars based on perceived performance and didn’t want to get stuck with a “lemon” that was too hard to use. If you watch TV commercials for cars today, you’ll see a completely […]