It’s 2007. Apple launched the iPhone. People played games on the Wii and watched movies on Blu-ray. Second Life was a thing. Nerds were just becoming cool. Aruba launched Airheads Online with 100 members.
Twelve years later, we never dreamed there would be 100,000 Airheads.
People are what makes the Airheads community so great. We’re network engineers, IT managers, inventors, product marketers and channel professionals. But in the end, we are all networking nerds, and that makes our digital space special.
Airheads is about people solving problems for each other. We can have honest conversations and get advice from others who are in the network trenches. When we run into a tough problem, we know we can pop onto Airheads, ask a question, and get a correct answer right away. It might be another network engineer who’s faced the problem before. It might be an Aruba developer or product line manager who answers.
A few months ago at Atmosphere in Las Vegas, I had dinner with @msabin, an Airheads MVP, and he was understandably grumpy about being on the phone all day with support. There were several other Airheads MVPs with us and our dinner turned into a troubleshooting session. We finished the dinner and walked away satisfied for two reasons—great food and a problem resolved. Read more about it here.
Many of our original members are still active. Shout out to @albertpang, our longest active account (12.75 years)!
The Airheads community is accessible anywhere, anytime, but we have our roots in getting people together face to face. Take walk down memory lane at the 2012 Airheads conference.
Our efforts grew into Atmosphere, with events in 20 cities around the world. Practical, useful content continues to top the agenda.
The Airheads community looks a lot prettier today, and our design has come a long way from our bulletin board days. But our content has proven to have long-lasting value. A 2016 post, “What does Wi-Fi stand for,” still rings as one of our most popular.
Why has Airheads endured?
At Aruba, we believe in customer first, customer last. We are committed to maintaining a great place on the Internet for networking nerds. From our technical executives to our systems engineers, we actively contribute to the community. Network practitioners, from the experts to the young bucks, share information and ask questions. Together, we have created a vibrant community for every type of networking nerd.
As Airheads community manager, I thank you, our members.