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Nokia N95 – some issues April 25, 2007

Posted by mark in : Device, Geo, Telecoms, VoIP, Wireless , add a comment

Last year, I mentioned that I’d be looking for a new phone, and listed some desirable features. Nokia’s N95 looks and feels less attractive than I’d expected, but is novel at the moment in being GPS-enabled (and has a lot of other features).

GPS is a feature I’d particularly like to try, as well as some VoIP and photo applications I’ve read about over the last couple of years …to better understand the user experience, issues and other possible services and business cases. I don’t like ‘walled gardens’. (Mapperz has listed some free applications.)

Dean Bubley reports that handsets with built-in GPS were “flavour of the month” at 3GSM. Mobile Weblog reports that GPS device makers are developing mobile handsets, and a WSJ article that Nokia will use GPS (and LBS services) as a strategy to maintain its handset prices.

Issues :

Links 2007-04-22 April 22, 2007

Posted by mark in : Geo, Networks, Telecoms, VoIP, Wireless , add a comment

Links 2007-04-18 April 18, 2007

Posted by mark in : Application, General, VoIP , add a comment

Skype destroying value? April 9, 2007

Posted by mark in : Application, Telecoms, VoIP , add a comment

“Skype is a strategic screw-up” says Martin Geddes, and it’s an interesting (short) read, from halfway through his longer post.

I used PC-based Skype for a year or so (but not for nearly a year now), as a previous ‘employer’ kept in touch that way; but I hoped that an open standards-based protocol (SIP) would prevail.

That isn’t Martin’s point, though. It seems to be that the PC-based experience is still reasonable, but Skype should have insisted that approved handsets allow the same experience, because now the whole service has less value. (They should have added to the basic feature set, with new innovation and reliability, but they’ve missed an opportunity and gone backwards instead.)

“Ease of use and simplicity for the user” February 15, 2007

Posted by mark in : Design, Telecoms, VoIP, Wireless , add a comment

(Alcatel-Lucent CEO) Pat Russo’s recent interview with the FT struck a chord :

What would you most love to see?

I’d love to see the communications industry tackle ease of use and simplicity for the user. Phones are actually getting more complex.

It’s been said many times before, and reminded me of a quote on Dave Farber’s IP list :

I have always wished that my computer would be as easy to use as my telephone. My wish has come true. I no longer know how to use my telephone — Bjarne Stronstrup (originator of C++ programming language)

AuPix blog February 14, 2007

Posted by mark in : Personal, Telecoms, Video, VoIP , add a comment

AuPix (my day job) started a blog recently, and I may post there occasionally.

Check out John’s posts, once he gets started properly, for insights from a ‘veteran‘ of the video telephony industry.

3GSM preview from Dean Bubley February 9, 2007

Posted by mark in : Event, Telecoms, VoIP, Wireless , add a comment

Next week is the 3GSM ‘World Congress’ (ie. mobile phone show), and Dean Bubley has a prediction of the hot topics.

Several are familiar from his blog (and others). Rollout of HSUPA sounds like it would (better) enable some interesting services, so I’ll keep an eye out for analysis of that.

Gizmo VoIP on mobile November 29, 2006

Posted by mark in : Telecoms, VoIP, Wireless , 1 comment so far

Nokia announced today that their N80i dual mode phone will have Gizmo software installed. With a Wifi connection, you’ll have free calls to any SIP-compliant VoIP phone (eg. Gizmo Project softphone or AuPix AP-100! …but not the proprietary Skype), and cheap calls to other landlines and mobiles. When there’s no Wifi, you can still make ‘normal’ calls, over the cellular network.

The review at O’Reilly tells of a good user experience, and a nice integration. So, next year I may get a new Nokia (N80i or N95), because the new Treo’s haven’t excited me.

Was Skype a good purchase for eBay? November 13, 2006

Posted by mark in : General, VoIP , add a comment

The International Herald Tribune has a seemingly balanced article, that sees benefits, but doubts that the price will be justified. That’s not a new view, nor a proven one, but the article has an interesting update of the situation, a year or so in.

Further commentary on Andy Abramson’s blog.

AuPix September 25, 2006

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Tomorrow I start a new job, as Finance Director of AuPix Ltd, a Bristol startup working on ‘Video and Voice over IP‘ (VaVoIP). It took an opportunity like this to tempt me back into regular employment, and I’m really looking forward to it!

AuPix acquired IPR from SCOTTY Group, video technology which had been developed by UK-listed Motion Media plc before its 2004 ‘merger’ with SCOTTY. The AuPix team is mostly directors and engineers from the former Motion Media

Asterisk (telephony) September 14, 2006

Posted by mark in : Telecoms, VoIP , add a comment

A couple of interesting posts, at a time when I want to understand Asterisk better …probably by buying (yet another) O’Reilly book

Firstly, Evan Henshaw-Plath’s “Integrating Asterisk and Rails” talk [pdf] at RailsConf Europe, including a list of ‘Fun Applications’ :

  • Listen to mp3 streams on your phone
  • Text to speech RSS reader
  • Email you mp3’s of your voicemail
  • Interactive voice driven Zork
  • Speakeasy – A volunteer community translation service
  • Make payphones ring when you walk by them
  • Trap telemarketers in an endless menu system
  • Spoof Caller ID
  • Add voice & phone interfaces to your Rails applications

…[via Peter Ferne]. I think this is the same topic as a “Hacking Asterisk and Rails with RAGI” article from Dec-05, but it’s a bit beyond me yet

Secondly, “Building Advanced Telecom Apps on a Shoestring” by Brian McConnell …[via Ken Camp]

ROK? – Not so much September 11, 2006

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The ROK Viper application was the 3rd UK Mobile VoIP story on 4 Sep, which I chose not to mention at the time

I’ve since seen a few critical comments, as people point out that it’s not really Mobile VoIP and it’s not compelling, and those are interesting

UK Mobile VoIP stories September 4, 2006

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Andy Abramson and TechCrunch UK both report the news that Mobiboo (London) has begun to offer a Mobile VoIP service, over Wi-fi, as an alternative to cellular

Andy also points to a story on newswireless.net that AQL (Leeds) is inviting Nokia E series users to sample free peer-to-peer Wi-fi calling over its mobile VoIP network

(They explain these better than I can. I need to think it through, later this week)

Voice 3.0 September 3, 2006

Posted by mark in : Telecoms, VoIP , add a comment

Ken Camp has an interesting taxonomy of telecoms voice service, which puts current early adopters at ‘Voice 2.5′/ 2.6

It begins part way through the linked post, with the paragraph “Voice 1.0 was dial tone” and ends with :

And perhaps it is time for the Requiem for VoIP, because VoIP isn’t the future. The future is Voice 3.0. And in that world, VoIP is just a facet of unified communications. Unified communications consisting of voice, video, presence, and user control coupled with fully converged services, including ubiquitous mobility and widespread application integration

The Top 30 VoIP blogs August 29, 2006

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A personal list of the top 30 ‘Voice over IP’ blogs from Smith on VoIP …[via Ken Camp's Realtime VoIP]

I have tried to rank these blogs based on their importance in providing thought provoking innovative work on the Voice Over IP industry. There is plenty of room for debate