March 16th, 2008
Russell Shaw, rest in peace
Editor’s note: Russell Shaw passed away on March 14. For more information, see Between the Lines. His family requested that we post this notice so people know that all scheduled meetings are canceled.
March 7th, 2008
Sorry, Gizmodo, VoIP over iPhone isn’t going to be “huge”
Gizmodo’s Brian Lam (no, not the C-SPAN guy, that’d be Brian Lamb) notes a snippet from Apple’s SDK-coming-out-part press conference in which one Mr. Jobs noted that any third-party iPhone developer cooks up a VoIP program for iPhone, the utility will be allowed to work via any Wi-Fi hotspots that might be in range.
VoIP over iPhone via AT&T’ Mobility’s cell network. Sorry, not gonna happen.
Brian thinks VoIP over iPhone WiFi is going to be “huge.”
I’m not so sure, though. Mobile VoIP is making some inroads in the enterprise and SMB sectors, but less so for the consumer. I mean, Vonage tried VoIP over Wi-Fi, but then quietly dropped their offering. Not enough demand, and reports of less-than-stellar tech quality.
Before I offer more a more conclusive assessment about the longer-term prospects VoIP over iPhone, let me see what the 3P devs come up with.
March 7th, 2008
Over WiFi at DIA, free speech is DOA
SI model Jessica Gomes, 
if you must know.
Our own Maggie Reardon expands on a Denver Post story that notes the Denver International Airport has chosen to block Wi-Fi access to such sites as boingboing.net, the website of Vanity Fair magazine, and even the web link to Sports Illustrated’s swimsuit issue.
Maggie notes that the airport’s spokesman Chuck Cannon told the Associated Press on Wednesday that he would rather “weather infrequent complaints about access than handle angry parents whose children might see pornography.”
Well, excuse me. Aren’t magazines with far more “pornographic” sold at DIA newsstands? And how many children would be Web surfing via WiFi at any airport?
Well, I suppose that if you and a couple of your kids are at the gate, waiting on a plane, and a guy sits next to your brood and directs his Wi-Fi enabled notebook to the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue landing page, well, would your kid is on the road to ruin.
One more note of hypocrisy. Some of the same parents who presumably would complain about access to the SI swimsuit issue over airport WiFi might be proud of their son, nephew, sister, husband, etc., for fighting for “our freedoms” in Iraq.
March 6th, 2008
Exclusive: iPhone DevCamp’s Raven on iPhone SDK and what it means
Just a few minutes ago, I had a most enlightening email conversation with someone who knows as much about the new iPhone SDK, and its effects/potential, as anyone who doesn’t work at Apple. And probably know more than most who do.
That’d be Raven Zachary, who you may know as key force behind the iPhone DevCamp, (group-and-grin from 2007 SF event in pic) as well as an analyst and perhaps THE key thought leader in the third party iPhone developer community.
Raven had some thoughts on the new iPhone SDK. I know you are here because you want to know what he thinks.
Comin’ at ya!:
RS: Your overarching thoughts on SDK?- is it what you hoped for in terms of flexibility, ease of use, etc?
RZ: This is what the development community was hoping for - a platform that allowed developers to build native applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch. In terms of openness, it looks to be something in- between what Apple does today with the iPod Games market and the Mac. Developers can write almost anything, but will need to distribute the software through the iTunes App Store, with Apple taking a 30% revenue share for distribution, billing, and marketing, basically. Developers wanting to distribute free applications through the App Store will be allowed to do so, as well.
RS: How does SDK functionality change the game for 3-party iPhone devs?
RZ: 3rd party development for the iPhone up until now was web-based through Safari, and a small number of people in the hacker community working on unofficial apps. We’re now going to see an entire new market created around native applications, and providing functionality not possible through web development. You’ll see iPhone development for web-based applications, just not exclusively.
RS: Are you troubled by the Apple “control” issue, i.e. they reserve right of approval?
RZ: No, because it seems that Apple will only limit this in extreme situations. Steve Jobs was quoted in the Q&A session with the media that they would even allow VOIP applications, although limited to Wifi and not over the carrier network. What we don’t have here is Apple review of all source code, which would have been time consuming and expensive.
RS: In SDK, what’s cool?
RZ: Everything, pretty much. Apple has provided a large sandbox for developers while still providing for data security.
RS: In SDK what’s missing that ought to be there?
RZ: There are still a number of unanswered questions from today’s announcement, such as hardware and peripheral connectivity, but these will be answered by Apple in time.
RS: Any other thoughts?
RZ: Don’t underestimate this market and the disruption on RIM (BlackBerry). Kleiner Perkins is putting $100m into the iFund, and this platform has a very exciting future, and one with plenty of commercialization opportunities for 3rd party developers.
March 5th, 2008
Is proprietary iPhone video player on the way?
In remarks to analysts yesterday, Apple CEO Steve Jobs clarified why the iPhone does not support Flash.
Jobs said a key reason is that Adobe’s Flash Player is optimally built for laptops. Because laptops are larger than the iPhone, the performance of Flash on the iPhone would be too slow.
“There’s this missing product in the middle,” Jobs said.
When I hear someone such as Steve Jobs utter the word “missing,” I don’t take the usage of the word casually.
Even though- as you see at the top of this post- iPhone is YouTube compliant, that’s just a start. I think this means a special video player platform for the iPhone is on the way.
Do you?
March 4th, 2008
Truphone cuts international rates with new Tru Zone offering
Today, Wi-Fi centered mobile Internet service provider Truphone announced a pretty significant per-minute calling cost reduction on calls from the U.S. to 40 countries.
Marketed as Tru Zone, these calls will be USD0.06 per minute to landlines and USD0.30 per minute.
The 40 countries in the “Tru Zone” include most EU countries, as well as Australia, Japan and Russia.
Calls to other nations, China, Hong Kong, U.S. and Canada - will cost even less, at just USD0.06 per minute to both landlines and mobiles.
Truphone likes to compare these rates to those of standard wireless plans. They cite the cost of a Verizon Wireless call to Germany without an international calling plan to be as much as $1.49 per minute for a landline call or $1.68 per minute for a mobile call.
Truphone CEO James Tagg (bad pub alert: “telephone Tagg”) is not reticent to plug the win-win of “Tru Zone.”
“People don’t know how much they’ll be charged to make a mobile call to friends abroad or to call back home from holiday. But they do know it’s expensive,” Tagg said in a statement “We’ve made it simple for customers by eliminating roaming charges. Now they can pay the same low price to make a call, wherever they are in the world.
“Wi-Fi and the Internet, which we use to carry our customers’ calls, is almost everywhere,” he added. ?Those on holiday, expatriates, migrant workers, business people, anyone with friends, family or colleagues in a different country… they can all now sidestep high international roaming fees. People should be hanging up on roaming charges, not be hung up on them.”
March 4th, 2008
Score one for the little guy: FCC entirely backs consumer in Sprint slamming case
The meme that this FCC
is highly partial to the interests of large broadband service providers and telcos has often been hammered home on these screens.
While I am certainly not ready to contradict those overarching feelings, I nevertheless feel enthusiastic and obligated to tell you about those FCC decisions in which the consumer wins.
One of those just crossed my disk this morning.
In rather strong language (”it is ordered,” “absolution,” etc.) the FCC has just come down on the side of a consumer in a forced carrier change (”slamming”) case.
Joy rules.
As the FCC said in their order:
In this Order, we consider the complaint alleging that Sprint Communications Company, L.P. (Sprint) changed Complainant’s telecommunications service provider without obtaining authorization and verification from Complainant in violation of the Commission’s rules. We conclude that Sprint’s actions did result in an unauthorized change in Complainant’s telecommunications service provider and we grant Complainant’s complaint.
The next section of this ruling indicates the statutes that the FCC cited as the reason for this decision:
In December 1998, the Commission released the Section 258 Order in which it adopted rules to implement Section 258 of the Communications Act of 1934 (Act), as amended by the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (1996 Act). Section 258 prohibits the practice of “slamming,” the submission or execution of an unauthorized change in a subscriber’s selection of a provider of telephone exchange service or telephone toll service.
In the Section 258 Order, the Commission adopted aggressive new rules designed to take the profit out of slamming, broadened the scope of the slamming rules to encompass all carriers, and modified its existing requirements for the authorization and verification of preferred carrier changes.
The rules require, among other things, that a carrier receive individual subscriber consent before a carrier change may occur.
Pursuant to Section 258, carriers are absolutely barred from changing a customer’s preferred local or long distance carrier without first complying with one of the Commission’s verification procedures. Specifically, a carrier must: (1) obtain the subscriber’s written or electronically signed authorization in a format that meets the requirements of Section 64.1130; (2) obtain confirmation from the subscriber via a toll-free number provided exclusively for the purpose of confirming orders electronically; or (3) utilize an independent third party to verify the subscriber’s order.
If you want to read on about the FCC’s siding with the consumer in this case, well, then, just make with the “click-y.”
March 4th, 2008
Fonality boosts presence detection in new PBXtra4.0
Got a guided tour the other day of business phone system solutions provider Fonality’s new PBXtra 4.0 phone system.
Announced this morning, the new rev offers enhanced presence detection under the aegis of FindMe with Boomerang Mobile Integration.
The sell here is a new ability to automatically find employees on their mobiles, offering them the option of answering their call or have it bounce to other locations.
“With this release, we know more about users- and use that (knowledge to an advantage. You can, for example, tell when users are in, and (if they are, say to yourself) “why not make the call now,” Fonality CEO Chris Lyman told me during the demo.
Largely for the reasons Chris cited, I find FindMe’s presence detection capabilities as the big plus here. Newly available is a functionality that offers rules-based observation and detection for keyboard and mouse activity. If no such activity is detected within a specified interval, calls can be routed to the recipient’s cell phone.
March 4th, 2008
Uh-oh: Oprah’s streamed New Earth Event runs short on bandwidth
Last night’s inaugural, Skype co-sponsored webcast of Oprah Winfrey’s Oprah.com New Earth Event scored 500,000 simultaneous log-ins.
That would be all well and good, but the gathering multitudes resulted in 242 Gbps of information moving over the ‘net at the same time.
This morning, Oprah.com is posting a statement acknowledging resulting delays in viewing the webcast, and noting that work is continuing to find a specific cause for what happened.
The statement says in part:
Harpo Productions, Inc., Move Networks and Limelight Networks recognize that interactive Internet broadcasting to a mass audience is still an emerging medium, and we’re proud to have been pioneers in pushing the industry forward. We deeply regret that some of our audience did not have an optimal viewing experience and apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. The first session of the webinar will be available in its entirety for viewing on Oprah.com or for downloading as a podcast on Oprah.com or iTunes (later today).
March 3rd, 2008
Reader: AT&T tells me Time Warner Cable is blocking his VoIP
A reader and information technology professional in the New York area sent me an email this morning that raises the possibility that his high-speed Internet service provider Time Warner Cable 
may be blocking his AT&T CallVantage VoIP service.
Not only does the reader wish to describe his issue, but he would like to hear from others who may be undergoing similar experiences. But first, here’s this reader’s account o what’s been going on:
This past Thursday, TimeWarner did a big upgrade of their service in our area where the network (primarily cable but I’m assuming Internet as well) went down for 3-6 hours. When it came back up, my CallVantage service has stopped working.
After many many hours of talking to both ATT and Time Warner, resetting the TA device, rebooting etc. I still have no phone service. The TA device clearly works - it sees all fo the IP Address info from Time Warner and ATT can see the device on their network. However, I cannot get dial tone.
ATT says the problem is that TimeWarner is blocking certain UDP ports their app needs. They claim they see this problem with TimeWarner Cable frequently. At this point, I am convinced they are right. Have you heard of this yourself? Is this legal? I’ve had no phone service for 4 days. Suppose my business was out of my house?
Anyway, I’m trying to find out if others have seen this kind of behavior by TimeWarner and what there is to do about it.
March 3rd, 2008
Apple co-founder Woz: sometimes I use a Moto Razr instead of an iPhone
In Sydney, Australia for a keynote speech at the Broadband and Beyond Conference this morning, Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak appeared to lament the fact that the iPhone doesn’t have 3G support in the U.S
During a press conference immediately after his keynote, the Sydney Morning Herald’s Asher Moses noted “Woz said he still used the iPhone and praised its internet capabilities but he also carried a 
Motorola Razr for taking calls and browsing the web.”
A Razr?
March 3rd, 2008
Sexism at the Apple Store? Woman claims “Genius” totally ignored her while pitching her husband
Seems as though when Consumerist reader Arjela and her husband entered an Apple store in Bellevue, Wash. to shop for a MacBook Air last week, she felt as though the Apple Store “genius” concentrated all of his sales efforts on the hubby and not on both.
Arjela, who is quite an experienced computer user, seems to be particularly ticked that during the consulation, the “Genius” aggressively pitched the Mr. on Apple Care, still ignoring her.
All this got her so pissed off she wrote Apple a letter and forwarded it to the Consumerist.
She wrote in part:
The Apple Store “genius” — and I’m offended that he was called that, given the stupendous idiocy he exhibited today — was named Bill. Bill was called over when my husband and I came into the store; I had told the concierge that I was interested in buying a MacBook Air.
Well, first of all, Bill DID NOT LOOK AT ME. He did not greet me. He greeted my husband, introduced himself, and shook his hand… and completely ignored me. He didn’t ask my name, what we were there to buy, or who the new computer was for. He did not make eye contact. He simply behaved as though I were not there, and steered my husband through the crowded store — ignoring me and leaving me behind.
When I caught up to them, he was commencing the hard-sell of “AppleCare”. After being told several times that I was not interested, he asked my husband if he was a Microsoft employee, and pointed out that he could get a 12% discount on it. My husband finally stopped Bill in his tracks and told Bill that the computer was for me. He asked Bill if the education discount, which I qualified for, or the Microsoft employee discount, which my husband qualified for, was a better deal. Bill told my husband that the education discount was better — but continued talking to my husband as if I were not there. Even after being told the computer was for me and that we’d be using my education discount on it, Bill did not greet me, make eye contact with me, or acknowledge my presence in any way.
After scrolling through a screen of peripherals and asking my husband — not me — about each one, and only giving up on selling us the items when my husband — not me — confirmed I was not interested, he muttered something I could not make out (I presume because he was, again, talking to my husband and not myself), and wandered off.
I did not wait for him to come back before leaving the Apple Store. As my husband was not interested in anything at the store, he left, too.
I have to tell you that when my girlfriend and I went into my local Apple store to look at iPhones and MacBook Pros, we got equal treatment. Heck, the store geeks talked to her more! I mean, she uses Macs in her school, and knows more about them than I do.
I only wish Arjela and her husband received equal attention as well.
Russell Shaw is an enterprise computing journalist, analyst and author based in Portland, Oregon. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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Recent Entries
- Russell Shaw, rest in peace
- Sorry, Gizmodo, VoIP over iPhone isn’t going to be “huge”
- Over WiFi at DIA, free speech is DOA
- Exclusive: iPhone DevCamp’s Raven on iPhone SDK and what it means
- Is proprietary iPhone video player on the way?
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