ETech and ETel: The Perfect Double Bill (Call for Participation Closes Soon!)

I'm happy to see these two together. This coming March in San Diego, O'Reilly's ETel (emerging telephony)and ETech (emerging technologies) conferences will be under the same roof at the same time. Each has its own distinct audience, but I am excited about what will happen in the hallways and shared evening events as the two groups pollinate.

But hang on, what the hell is ETel? "Telephony" is often taken to mean only voice, but our conference is all about the wider world of emerging communications. Twitter is a great example of how real-time communication has changed using IM, Web 2.0, and SMS. Mig33 has boomed (six million users) from a rich, presence-enabled handset IM. Grameenphone made livelihoods for families from phones that any teenager in the west would rather die than be seen using.

We are not discounting voice. We're just saying that it has siblings. What we aim to do through the ETel community is find ways to make voice communication more meaningful and appropriate through its relation with other technologies.

If you think that your product, project, or research fits our bill, let us know. ETel's Call for Participation is closing on Monday. You can still submit your ideas after the deadline to etel-idea@oreilly.com, but the ones that reach us on the deadline will be given priority. We don't need fully drafted talks, just outlines and proposals for what the talk will be about and what the aim will be.