VISI is proud to sponsor both the Fringe Festival and the first annual Fringey Awards. The Minnesota Fringe Festival is a Minneapolis-based nonprofit organization that organizes an annual, 11-day festival. The Fringey Awards is a video contest for Fringe companies.

In a nutshell, each of the Fringe companies can upload one 60-second video trailer or preview for the show they’ll be performing at the Minnesota Fringe - a trailer which they feel captures the essence of their performance in a less than a minute. The trailer can be an excerpt from the performance itself, or not. It can be funny, dramatic, shocking or whimsical.

Evaluation of the videos were conducted by three independent judges with backgrounds in theatre, media, and technology, providing 75 percent of the judging weight. In addition, anyone visiting the Fringey Web site is allowed to vote three times for their favorite Fringey videos — these online votes will be combined to count as a fourth judge (or 25% of the total).

The voting period was July 1st thru July 28th, 2009. We’ve tallied the votes and the results are in. We will be announcing the winner on August 9th at the Guthrie Theatre.  For now, we’ll list the three finalists (in no particular order):

Sarah, Your Ovaries Are Drying Up: The Musical

The Traveling Musicians

The Harty Boys in: The Case of the Limping Platypus

The Minnesota Fringe Festival starts today!  Visit the Fringey Awards or the Fringe site to pick out the shows you want to see.  Leave me a comment with your favorite shows!

The move to cloud computing is changing the landscape of IT in significant and far-reaching ways. With change comes uncertainty, confusion, and even disagreement about what the benefits of cloud computing truly are. Businesses from all over the globe are scoping out the prospect of purchasing cloud computing services. How do you know the investment is worth it? Attend Cloud VISION 2009, a cloud computing seminar dedicated to separating the facts from the hype.

Cloud VISION will be held the morning of October 21, 2009, at the Metropolitan Ballroom and Clubroom in Minneapolis. The conference will provide IT managers and business executives the opportunity to hear from technology leaders on the topic of the business advantages of cloud computing. Learn first-hand how cloud computing can benefit your business.

Two keynote speakers will present their knowledge of cloud computing while you dine on a breakfast of bacon, sausage, scrambled eggs with aged cheddar cheese, and more.

PRESENTATIONS
Chris Howard, Vice President of Burton Group, will answer questions such as: What is the cloud computing business case? What are the business risks? How do I get from here to there?

Jason Baker, Chief Technology Officer, VISI, will provide an overview of the VISI cloud infrastructure and demonstrate the instant activation and control panel features.

LOCATION
The Metropolitan is conveniently located just a few minutes west of downtown Minneapolis with easy freeway access and ample free parking.

GIVEAWAYS
In addition to breakfast, all attendees will receive free VISI logo gear upon entry. At the end of the session, there will be a drawing for a 24-inch Apple LED Cinema Display!

REGISTER
More details about the seminar as well as registration information can be found at www.visi.com/cloud2009. Registration is free!

This seminar can’t be missed if you want to get ahead in the clouds.  Reserve your seat today.

I had never attended a webinar before July 15. I hadn’t even heard of webinars before a few months ago. And there I was, being trained in on how to organize everything behind the scenes of VISI’s “Cost Comparison of Hosted Exchange and In-House Deployment” webinar before ever attending one. My initial perception was that it would be similar to those “celebrity chats” put on by publicists – a frenzied slew of people typing questions to a designated typist who chooses a mere few to answer, before leaving those who tuned in feeling unfulfilled and desperate for more. As the day grew nearer for my first webinar, I began to pick up bits of information that eventually led me to the conclusion that webinars truly are seminars, just over the internet. I was very impressed with the way Ray Hagen, Product Manager at VISI, expertly prepared for the webinar with a reheasal and PowerPoint, before going on to conduct the webinar in a professional manner one week later. You can read about his presentation and download his PowerPoint here.

Why was I so keenly unaware as to the status of webinars? It’s simple. I had only just started working at VISI in the middle of June shortly after graduating with degrees in both Marketing and Philosophy from Saint Mary’s University in Winona, Minnesota. Never before had I worked for a company or completed a class project that required webinar viewing. My title at VISI is “Marketing and Public Relations Coordinator”, something I have been striving to be for the past four years through my studies. And yes, I will be the one setting up future webinars. If something goes wrong, I am the one to blame. If you have a topic to suggest, I am the one to inform. And I am excited to be that person.

With that in mind, VISI is always looking for fresh, exciting topics to inform you on. We would love to know what you are looking for in future webinars. Are there any technology topics that you would like to learn more about? Think about what you want for your business and how you plan to achieve it. If VISI can help, we will. Post a response to this blog with your ideal webinar topic and we will do our best to fulfill your wish.

I want to thank all who attended our webinar, Microsoft Exchange: Comparing Hosted vs. In-house Deployments this past Wednesday. The questions that followed the presentation were excellent and I’d like to thank all those who contributed. Two topics really resonated in the questions that I wanted to reinforce with this blog post. One, how are mobile Blackberry devices are supported and two, what if variables in the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) example were different.

Blackberry devices are an increasingly valuable tool for connecting a mobile workforce. A few things to keep in mind if you want full push-access between Exchange and a Blackberry device. Integration needs to take place between Exchange and a Blackberry server to experience the full push. A hosted Exchange provider includes this integration, without the purchase of Blackberry or Exchange server licenses, in the monthly device fees.

A TCO model is a good baseline to understand all the elements required to purchase, implement and operate a system. It is well applied in looking at Exchange, as it is more than just buying a server license and hardware. To make the right decision for your organization, you need to understand all the costs - direct, indirect and opportunity - associated with an in-house Exchange deployment. All costs structures are different and the TCO model used in the webinar (and available in the follow up whitepaper) provides you with the framework to plug-in your costs and make the right decision for you business.

You can download the entire presentation here. Download the Total Cost of Ownership White Paper here.

When I first found out VISI received permission from the Fringe Festival to construct an online video contest for participating Fringe Festival shows, I was giddy. The Minnesota Fringe Festival is 11 days of nonstop performing arts action. With multiple theatre locations and dozens of shows a day, choosing which Fringe Festival to see rivals an Olympic sport for some. For the casual festival-goer, the choices can be daunting. In 2008, the Fringe Festival issued 40,929 tickets to 154 shows.

VISI has launched the first annual Fringey Awards – and the exciting part of it is the mutual benefits it will give to Fringe Festival shows and festival-goers alike! Since the participating artists get a portion of box office sales for their show, it behooves them to promote their show as much as possible. By submitting their web trailers to the Fringey Awards, they increase their online advertising and a chance to win $500 to boot. The video submissions can be excerpts from actual Fringe Festival performances or simply teasers.

The benefit to the theatre-goers is being able to get a sneak preview of the shows before attending the festival. Any visitors to the Fringey Awards site will also be able to vote for their favorite trailers through July 28th.

Now that voting on the website is live and we’re spreading the word through Facebook and Twitter, I can say I’m still pretty giddy about this event. VISI is enabling the Minnesota Fringe Festival to further their mission: connecting adventurous artists to adventurous audiences. Go see a show!