On This Day

It is arduous to find something to write about that doesn’t make me mad. Everything on the news, every email from a factory, any text message from Southwest Airlines about my flight – they all seem to just piss me off.

 So, I had to dig deep.

I have been using the same email service for years. So, I decided to look back at my email for this day in 2012. Queue the harp music and set the way back machine…

You see, 2012 was a simpler time.
We were all so young and pure.  We were filled with hopes and dreams. Anything was possible in AV.

Here are some of the fun discussions we were having:

We were setting up an open house for the Prysm Laser-on-Phosphor video wall product in San Jose. Yup. We actually sold some of that. I have no idea how, but I bet it involved Joey D’Angelo.

Dane Butcher, the founder of Symetrix and an awesome dude, was coming down from Seattle to talk to fancy consultants under NDA as he was cooking up something disruptive. I loved it when Dane came to town. He treated me like a peer even though he was at least a billion times smarter than me.

I was auditing classes at Singularity University that day.  For whatever reason, I needed to share that with Ross from CM Salter via email. We chatted about “Terminator” and death rays.

I had some banter going with Dan Meehan of Panasonic. Dan was an amazing help there. I assume he still is. I really haven’t spoken to him in years. Repping Panasonic was pretty much awful. But Dan and Andy Dick are a pleasure to work with.

FSR had just come out with an 8×8 HDMI matrix switcher and I was struggling to get people to consider FSR as a serious contender to RGB Spectrum and Extron. I was clearly begging for someone to give me a shot. Nobody did. Thanks, Bay Area!

So, in 2012, on this day, there is a lot of stuff we did not talk about. Nobody had email signatures signaling virtue of any kind. There was not a single email checking availability. Not one asking for a price either. There were no terse words. I was not in constant danger of brands “going direct”. What a difference a decade makes.

I was pretty sure I would be retired, driving a hover-car and going up in space for vacation by now. Instead, I am still selling HDMI matrices…but this time with success. It’s ok. I still love my job. Let’s do this again in 10 years.