Along the same line:
I'm in IT, have been 16 years, own an IT consulting business for the past 12.5 yrs and I'm seeing some dramatic shifts in our industry. Much like all of you fighting a losing battle with installing key or pbx systems, I'm installing fewer and fewer on-site servers. Installing and maintaining fewer workstations too as a lot of things are going mobile, tablet, or smartphone based. Everything is going to the "cloud". Line of business apps, e-mail, etc. All of my business will become how do I make recurring revenue partnering with cloud vendors on slim margins rather than labor from remotely or on-site configuring & maintaining servers. It stinks. I'd rather be working with my hands installing servers, data cabling, etc. For what it is worth, I've bowed out of installing VoIP for my clients. In fact I pushed one of my clients to someone on this forum to get a small pbx system since it was what they needed.
So things aren't all that rose-y on this side of the tracks.
I'm also seeing the end of copper telco plant in this state. As a contractor for a CLEC installing various DSL and POTS services, that will be real hard for the CLEC to continue to do business with a LEC that is doing almost no maintenance and employees with real knowledge retiring.
Scary times ahead. Wish I had better news for you OP.
