Social Media Round-Up [August, 2019]

There are many ways to ask questions about HPE and NonStop. You may have noticed that this year there are more and more channels opening up that encourage open dialogues among the NonStop community. Whether you are part of the Facebook public group, Tandem Computers, simply follow the twitter handle @Connect2NonStop or if you use the LinkedIn group you can join Tandem User Group or just search on “Tandem” or “NonStop” as there are multiple ways to engage with the NonStop community on LinkedIn.

Wondering why these groups feature a mix of Tandem and NonStop? There are plenty of YouTube video clips as well, including numerous videos produced by NonStop vendors, just don’t do a search on NonStop but rather, HPE NonStop Systems as you will be inundated with clips of musicians and yes, even churches. However, if you want to listen to past interviews with HPE execs explaining the NonStop product line, these videos are invaluable. However, the downside of videos is that they are for the most part, unidirectional – while there are opportunities to provide comments these are not places to go to ask a lot of questions.

Social media channels provide the NonStop community with a collection of objective and yes, more often than not, highly opinionated and very subjective commentaries. Contrary to popular consensus, these channels are not a “place for old men!” Yes, to paraphrase the title of a popular movie isn’t an exercise in finger pointing but rather a reflection that there is so much knowledge tucked away in the minds of many former Tandem and NonStop personnel – men and women – and all you have to do is ask the right question and you will be inundated with meaningful results.

When NonStop Insider was first published we encouraged the NonStop community to reach out to this digital publications’ editor via the email address editor@nonstopinsider.com but to date there has been no takers. Likewise more recently, we launched another channel soliciting questions from the NonStop community, nonstop.mailbag@gmail.com . Again, with the exception of one cheerful email, no takers! One way to check out the variety of groups where Tandem and or NonStop are the focus, just email us an update at editor@nonstopinsider.com

Social media channels fulfil many roles. Their popularity is due to there being a perception that every question is welcomed even as there is an understanding that among the NonStop community, there is a willingness to share ideas. When I posted “A really big cheerio! to all my Aussie mates planning on attending OzTUG,” to LinkedIn, for instance, there were 350+ views over a very brief period. However, all this really demonstrated was that the NonStop community does read posts on sites like LinkedIn and although we cannot match either the views or likes of today’s reality stars, all the same it’s encouraging to see!

But ultimately, none of these channels or these avenues seems to be showing engagement in numbers; there is almost nothing going on of any merit! So, what’s happening? And, is it bad news for the community? When you talk to the NonStop team one thing jumps out almost immediately – the NonStop team is doing a really good job of directly interacting with the NonStop community and this isn’t bad news on any account. The NonStop community knows who to contact and for the most part, it takes advantage of relationships the NonStop team openly fosters.

The only concern that may exist among the NonStop community is whether or not these current relationships will scale – what happens if HPE is truly successful taking NonStop into new markets, in taking NonStop to the edge or for that matter, taking NSaaS / DBaaS into clouds? Will we see an increase in NonStop personnel to accommodate such growth? Again, after talking to HPE management this isn’t likely to happen. Quite the contrary – HPE is looking to streamline its operations and success of NonStop will be achieved with only marginal increases in personnel, if at all – get to know Pointnext and get to know DXC Technology. And yes, get to know the growing number of NonStop services providers …

Social media discussion groups, whether on business or social sites, are still places to go when pursuing other channels proves ineffective. Taking nothing away from the NonStop team however, being visible on many different channels offers alternatives to simply sitting back, waiting for an email response. As the old story goes, “There are no stupid questions, only stupid answers.” So find a channel that suits your needs and ask those questions and again, if you are at a loss to know where to start then email us at editor@nonstopinsider.com

Thank you.

@RichardKBuckle
#HPEblogger
#NonStopRocks
#Fools4NonStop