Reasoned Recap: 2014

Time is fleeting. As we get older we all say how quickly the year goes by and that was most certainly the case for me in 2014. It has been a year that brought so many opportunities and people into my life in ways that I could never have envisioned. This is a year that seems to be shaping up to be one of my best, while still seeing miles of road ahead to grow both professionally and personally. But while all that lies out in the future, there is so much gratitude that needs to be expressed for what’s happened in the last twelve months.

Yup, I’m still talking about Net Neutrality

It’s pretty easy to say that this has been the year of net neutrality for me. With ten pieces written on the subject matter from the stand point of the AV industry, along with presenting the issue to the industry leaders at the CI Summit, and hosting the only panel discussion on the subject and its effect on professionals in AV, it dominated a lot of my attention this year. I spent so much time discussing this topic that certain members of the AV community known for enjoying a debate wouldn’t even breech the topic when it came up during a live broadcast discussion.

My entire goal was to bring the issue to light and get a discussion started. The discussion of AV/IT has been a dominant topic among all those in the AV industry and the blogosphere in particular this year. If we turned a blind eye on the discussion of net neutrality and didn’t raise our voices we could be facing a very complicated future with the technology we rely on today.

The ‘i’ in community isn’t just about you.

The second dominant subject that I spent a lot of time discussing in 2014 was the negativity that seems to live in the public presentation of the AV industry. While the internet is filled with people that are all looking to one-up each other on a discussion, there is a positive way to do it and a negative way to do it. The sheer number of response blogs that came out this year where ideas, concepts, and even people, were attacked was so very disappointing to me.

We live in the age of the screen-ager. That means that the majority of people are getting their information from a phone, a tablet, a computer, or some other electronic devices. A lot of that information might be gained through generic web searches. That means that the youth this industry is seeking to have for future development could be looking for information on us and what we do and find nothing but bickering and nit picking.

Discussion of ideas, theories, and topics are phenomenal for the industry and necessary for progress, but I would love to see the industry take the next step to do it in a way where there is more discussion than attack. This will surely better represent the community of AV professionals that exist online better than what you might currently find in searches for information.

It all started with InfoComm

While those two topics have been a significant portion of what dominated my mind share this year, I also said it’s been an incredible year. Starting with the huge honor of being asked to write for the InfoComm All Voices blog was where it started. This was also a significant part of my year because it introduced me to one of my dearest friends. Following that news, I found myself jolted with excitement when I was selected to teach a course on Audio DSP Fundamentals at InfoComm 2014.

Growing the (AV)Nation

The InfoComm show in Las Vegas was a huge week of activities that will stick with me for some time to come as the AVNation and REDBAND families were able to come together to bring a working professional’s stance on the state of the industry to the forefront. It was also my first experience working with the InfoComm Standards and Industry Innovations group. Being a part of that allowed me to sit a room with many of the people that have helped shape this industry to date, and I’m still not sure why they let me in the door, but that was one of the first moments I truly saw that the opportunities available to fill the need and aid the leadership in this industry.

What came out of that week at InfoComm was the merger of the AVNation and REDBAND group which, in turn, gave me added honors beyond just being part of it as I was asked to be the editor at the newly expanded AVNation. Additionally, seeing that there was a need for people to step up and be counted to help move the industry forward pushed me to submit my application for the InfoComm Certification Steering Committee, to which I was elected.

The hits kept on coming

There have been more honors and opportunities afforded to me by people throughout the industry this year, like being promoted at ICS to the Manager of AV Engineering, being on the CI 40 Under 40 list, attending and speaking at the CI Summit, and getting to interview and discuss the state of the industry with top level industry executives, but it is the humbling of having been elected to the InfoComm Certification Steering Committee that will be one of the big defining professional moments of 2014 for me.

We are the extension of those surrounding us

As I began, there is a great deal of gratitude that has to be passed around for what’s happened this year because I surely have not done it alone. With that in mind, I hope that 2014 has shown all of these people (in no particular order) the same wonderment that I have seen.

Chris Neto, Tim Albright, George Tucker, Dawn Meade, Harry Meade, Nermina Miller, Mark Coxon, Ann Brigida, Brock McGinnis, Betsy Jaffe, Chuck Espinoza, Chuck Wilson, Robb Woods, Simon Dudley, Bob Romano, Craig MacCormack, Tom Leblanc, Aaron Colton, Justin Gamble, Mark Berlo, Jim Thielemann, Victoria Ferrari, Patti Silverman (and all her folks at SF MusicTech), Elmo Lovano, Ted Cohen, David Blutenthal, Brad Grimes, Mike Brandes, Kelly Perkins, Starr Saunders, Francisco Ojeda, Anthony Zotti, Michael Shinn, Julie Samuels, Cris Privan, Chris Burns, Julia Wagner, and the rest of you that I have worked with directly, indirectly, or otherwise.

It’s been a year of adventure, progress, change, and more, and I cannot wait to see where what we’ve built this year carries us in 2015.