Who Is The VAR Guy? December 2008

Nine Lives Media — a division of Penton Media — gets asked the question all the time: Who Is The VAR Guy? Frankly, we don’t know for sure. But the following tidbits of information offer some clues about our anonymous channel insider.

That’s So Last Century

The VAR Guy has tracked everything about the channel and corporate IT starting in 1992. He has actually sat down with everyone from Bill Gates to John Chambers — though we’re not sure how he got a seat at those tables.

As an IT journalist, The VAR Guy  allegedly covered the birth of Windows NT, the rise of Cisco Systems, and just about every technology wave since the birth of LANs.

The (Nearly) New Millennium

The VAR Guy fell into blogging somewhere around 2005 or 2006. His voice popped up on a range of leading IT media sites. Again and again, pundits asked The VAR Guy whether he had his own site. By January of 2008, The VAR Guy went live with his own home on the web — www.TheVARguy.com.

Today, TheVARguy.com is:

Hello, I Must Be Going

Reach him by phone — assuming he has a number — and The VAR Guy sounds like a New Yorker one day, a New Englander the next. Apparently, he’s fickle with his allegiances as well, somehow rooting for the New York Jets, New York Mets, Boston Red Sox and New England Patriots. We know: It’s a pathetic mix.

Alas, The VAR Guy rarely returns voicemail. The best way to track him down — if at all — is via email (thevarguy [at] NineLivesMediaInc.com) or simply by posting comments (lots of comments) on this Web site. He typically replies to all reader comments.