Collaborative conferencing is marked as one of the fastest growing areas of communications technology. Increasingly distributed work forces, expanding partner networks, and rising travel expenses are spurring businesses worldwide to integrate web conferencing into every aspect of the product life cycle.

This year two important summits dealing with web conferencing, audio conferencing and video conferencing will take place, offering communications professionals, end users and service providers fresh insight into the uses, issues and trends in collaborative conferencing.

CCS Expo in New York and London

The second annual Collaborative Conferencing Summit (CCS) will be held at the Westin Times Square in New York City on Feb. 21-22 and at The Savoy in London on Feb. 22. A live satellite link will connect the two cities on Feb. 22.

Dedicated to web conferencing, audio conferencing, and video conferencing technologies deployed in all industries, the CCS event will host more than 50 cutting-edge, practitioner-led case studies, lectures, workshops, and interactive panels. Growth and evolution in collaborative conferencing is the main theme of this year's event, with topics ranging from how to integrate and leverage collaborative technologies to maximize business results and ROI, to changing business models and future trends, expectations, and forecasts for the industry.

Encounter's President and CEO, Ian Widger, will join a panel of industry representatives in a discussion entitled Evolution, Not Revolution. Mr. Widger and his co-panelists will discuss the evolution of conferencing technologies and show how organizations are improving efficiency and maintaining better levels of communications using the right form of collaborative conferencing technology.

Other topics include, Collaborative Conferencing Success Stories- How to Make it Happen. Convergence - Putting It All On the Network. And Telemedicine Tactics- Users Speak Out. Giving the keynote address is Brigadier General Nick Halley of the U.S. Army.

Sponsoring the CCS event is more than a dozen companies, including Microsoft, Tandberg, Polycom, ZDNet UK and Encounter Collaborative, which is providing webcast coverage of several of the presentations. For more information about registering for a webcast, visit http://www.ccsexpo.com.

Wainhouse Research

Later this year we'll see another major collaborative conferencing summit on the East Coast. The Wainhouse Research Summit will roll into Boston, MA on July 13 for a three-day event at the Colonnade Hotel. This year's theme is Driving Adoption of Rich Media Collaboration. The summit will explore the present state of the collaborative conferencing industry, what works and what doesn't, how collaborative conferencing is evolving, and the future role of service providers. Agenda topics include, Where are We Going with Web and Instant Messaging? From Servers to Services—How Goes the Battle? And Issues Facing Videoconferencing Deployment.

New this year will be a demonstration workshop, offering brief demonstrations of a variety of desktop solutions for enterprise conferencing and collaboration. Summit attendees will see first-hand the variety of video, web and IM collaboration products and services that are available today.

VoIP Growing Up Fast

Businesses communications using Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) grew substantially last year, jumping from just 3 percent in 2003 to 12 percent by the end of 2004. Market analysts predict Internet voice communications will continue to skyrocket, accounting for 40% of business telephone lines by 2009.

VoIP is a technology that allows you to make telephone calls using a broadband Internet connection instead of a regular (or analog) phone line.

For many companies, the allure of VoIP is cost-savings. With minimal investment in hardware, businesses can use their existing desktop computers and broadband connections to make phone calls all over the world at a fraction of the cost long-distance carriers charge. In some cases VoIP calls can be made for free.

Encounter offers VoIP integration with our web conferencing and audio conferencing services. Many of our customers have benefited from this service, with more expressing interest in VoIP everyday. Click to learn more about Encounter's VoIP solution.

Call for Speakers

Encounter provides ‘value add' services to our clients and prospects by hosting the Encounter Seminar Series—free web seminars that focus on utilizing audio and web conferencing technology. Some of the topics covered in Encounter's Seminar Series include: The Basics of Web Conferencing; Developing an e-Learning Strategy; Using Web-Based Virtual Classroom; Creativity and Innovation: The Keys to Corporate Growth; and How to Present Web Seminars Like a Pro.

We are currently looking for dynamic speakers to join the Encounter Seminar Series for the 2005 season. Get your message heard by registering to be an Encounter speaker today!

Why become an Encounter Speaker?

Encounter's Seminar Series is an ideal way to promote yourself as a speaker and introduce your company, products, online training techniques, ROI analysis, and management philosophy to a large audience.

Encounter will market your web seminar in several ways:

• You will be exposed to more than 50,000 Encounter clients and prospects.
• You will be featured in The Collaborator, Encounter's monthly publication.
• Encounter's website will feature your seminar with links to registration pages.
• Encounter will create all invitations, registration pages, reminder notices and attendance reports for your seminar.
• Your seminar will be archived for distribution and will be posted on Encounter's web site for replay.
• An Encounter event moderator will be on your event to make general announcements, introductions and facilitate the audio Q&A.

Encounter Offers Services to HumaniNet to Aid Tsunami Victims

Encounter Collaborative is proudly donating conferencing services to aid HumaniNet in its support of disaster relief in Sri Lanka.

HumaniNet is a non-profit organization supporting humanitarian relief around the world with technical assistance in information and communication technology. HumaniNet is currently helping a number of teams conducting relief work in areas affected by the recent Asian tsunami. One such team is World Concern, whose Director of Relief, Kelly Miller, is now on the ground in Sri Lanka.

Over the past week, HumaniNet helped Ms. Miller's team procure satellite phones and RBGAN terminals to help them in their relief efforts. On Friday, January 7, Encounter helped HumaniNet place a conference call to Ms. Miller, who reported on the work under way in the devastated region.

You can learn more about HumaniNet at www.humaninet.org.