I’m a Microsoft MVP!

Microsoft MVP Logo

I’m extremely pleased to announce that I’ve just received the Microsoft Most Valuable Professional (MVP) Award!

Microsoft Most Valuable Professionals, or MVPs, are technology experts who passionately share their knowledge with the community.
They are always on the “bleeding edge” and have an unstoppable urge to get their hands on new, exciting technologies.
MVPs are driven by their passion, community spirit and their quest for knowledge. Above all and in addition to their amazing technical abilities, MVPs are always willing to help others – that’s what sets them apart.

During 2016 I discovered – and became quite obsessed with – the concept and development of chatbots; I’m am excited with the possibilities. Microsoft’s own product is the BotFramework and various Cognitive Services.

Botframework

Earlier this year I started writing articles about Microsoft’s BotFramework, Amazon’s Alexa, and even connecting them together; almost 20 botframework articles in 2016, in total.

I started the London BotFramework meetup, which gained over a hundred members in a couple of days; the first meetup had Microsoft BotFramework Product team representation as well as great sessions from SkyScanner and JustEat. In the second meetup I decided to live-develop an Alexa skill and connect it to a botframework chatbot, whilst chatting to my Echo Dot! Great fun, and it actually worked!

The Upcoming Year

I’m loving the direction that chatbots and conversational interfaces are going, and I’m excited to see where it will go over the next 12 months; will Cortana rival Alexa? What else will come out of the amazing Cognitive Services and how will this be best exposed within Azure? What about the community? I’ll be signing up to every relevant conference I can over 2017, to attend and hopefully to speak at.

It’s going to be an exciting year; paradigm shifts and rapid changes to both software and hardware are coming our way! Brace yourselves!

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