For those of you who, like me, went out and bought a Nokia E70 (or many of the other Nokia wifi phones) you may have come across some of its Internet calling capabilities. Buying an unlocked one here in the States there is little one can do with it… however the Mobile Internet calling is slowly becoming the phenomena that I think will radically change and shake up the industry.
Skype on my wifi enabled windows mobile phone is even more of an indication.
The New York Times today has a very interesting article on the triumphs and difficulties with converged cellular/Wi-Fi service, as currently being tried by T-Mobile in Seattle. Apparently, it works well when going from cell to Wi-Fi; not so well in reverse.
I still believe that this is a technology that will radically alter the personal communications industry.
A while ago at 3GSM I was first introduced to the concept of UMA (also read this). Even for me the UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access) concept was a bit confusing for me as well…. is it real VoIP over a WLAN… does UMA mean the phone is WIFI? Well, I have tried to explain it in past articles but Oliver Starr over at Mobile Crunch really breaks it down in this post: A Quick and Dirty UMA Primer.
Enjoy. Its the future.
From the post:
There appears to be a ton of interest in UMA Technology as well as some confusion about the difference between a WLAN enabled handset (one with a WiFi radio as well as GSM/GPRS) and a UMA/Dual Mode handset which also sports the WiFi-GSM/GPRS Radio configuration but also includes the UMA software that enables the seamless switching from one mode to another even during (and without dropping) a call in progress. These are NOT the same thing as the information below, which I’ve culled from the progenitor of UMA technology, Kineto Wireless’ website.
The reason… “technical obstacles.” What those are Skype CEO Niklas Zennstrom wont say. I guess the example Rafe found was an Alpha Alpha Symbian version. For now if you really want Skype wherever you go you will have to get a Windows Mobile device.
But Symbian and Windows are less than 10 percent of the phones sold out there (and even less in the US market). Skype really needs to get themselves on all the other phones out there…
So the question really is, is this a problem of Skypes or is the moment just not ready yet. Like mobile video star-ups that tried to enter the arena 2 years ago the time is just not right yet. If the hardware is not ready yet because the people are not ready yet then perhaps Skype should just concentrate on higher end phones like Symbian and Windows and Palm (whatever their new OS may be) and wait for the inevitable trickling down of those mobile OS’s. I would imagine at least, in the case of Symbian, this wont take long.
That is f course that when all is said and done the carriers don’t just block Skype traffic from running on their networks and on WiFi phones that are sold with them branded onto it. Which their non-net-neutricality infrastructure is set up to do nicely and which is in their right as Skype would take traffic away from their calling plans. But perhaps this is an inevitability that the carriers will have to deal with as well.
Heard of Alarm.com? Alarm.com is a leading provider of wireless, Web-enabled interactive security and monitoring system technology. It’s a company that provides completely wireless security monitoring for anything from your house, to your office, to your yacht. I don’t have a yacht, but maybe one day soon. Alarm.com allows customers the ability to monitor and control their security systems remotely through the Web, and receive real-time text-messages and e-mail alerts that keep them informed of all types of activity on their property, not just alarms. They can even control lights with the click of a mouse button.
The monitoring can be done online as well as through updates to a cell-phone or blackberry. The alert system runs off a WifI connection. With VoIP starting to replace LAN lines in homes and offices, current security systems that utilize LAN lines will, Alarm.com claims, be rendered useless. The idea is that Alarm.com will provide the solution to this problem.
The Luxembourg based Voice IP company Skype has been getting a lot of attention from Israel lately in both the good and the bad. First there is the news that Israeli based Net2Phone (which is owned by Israeli based IDT) is suing Skype claiming that they infringed a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) patent first issued to Net2Phone in August 2000. Thats the bad attention
The good attention comes from Israeli based telecommunications solution company Comverse and the recent release of their “presence” orientated Klonies avatars onto the world yesterday, beginning with none other than Skype. I first came across Comverse’s Klonies avatars while at 3GSM and wrote a pretty extensive post about them here.
Fellow Mobilist Xen has confirmed the posts claim that the next phase includes the launch of the mobile service of “Klonies Caller IDâ€, which allows the receiver of the call to see the caller’s Klonie together with the name and number. So whenever I call a friend or send an SMS, the friend sees my Klonie on his\her mobile screen, regardless the local settings.
Why I love this? Here is a recap from my past post from 3GSM.
What makes avatars so special, as well as a powerful branding solution, in my mind, is that they allow a user to create a moment of of self expression on another person’s phone. Unlike the mobile phone wall paper, the mobile avatar allows one to define a signature of self expression on another person’s phone every time you call or SMS. No one has to be around to hear your self-expressing ring-tone or call you to hear your self-expressing ring-back. A little bit of you appears on the phone of every call you make. With the ability for “self-expression” being one of the driving forces behind ringtone and ringback sales, Avatars are only the next logical step provided they they can up the self expression ante, and that Comverse has done so well.
Turning a phone call into a moment of self expression, with something as fun and cute as Klonies, is probably the only legitimate way I can think of of creating push content for a mobile phone. Of course, you will always have the option to turn your avatar rendering off, but with little guys and girls so cute, fun and (excuse the photoshop speak) well rendered who would want to.
My one complaint, which my readers are probably used to hearing, is that I cannot yet use Klonies for Skype because I use a Mac and Personalise Skype is only for Skype for Windows 1.4 and upwards. That is what I get for picking a superior machine.
While the .mobi domain hopes to make mobile web browsing easier for the consumer (a subject still under debate), ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) is reportedly considering yet another telecommunications domain ending in .tel, which would act a lot like an interactive Yellow Pages containing contact information as well as the ability to then actually contact the person or company via SMS or “click-to-call” VoIP capability. Businesses could also use a “.tel” site to determine customers’ locations and route them automatically to the correct call center.
If the proposal is given a go ahead, it could come into effect by the end of this year. London-based Telnic Ltd has instigated this proposal and if approved would be running it.
This makes a little bit more sense then the .mobi domain which, first of all is to long for mobile devices and secondly has to much control over the content that consumers can access, thus creating potential problems I have written about before.
A .tel domain would, as I said before, allow a company or individual to create there own interactive Yellow Pages that will allow people to find constantly up to date contact information even if a person is constantly on the move.
If put into play, you can also bet that the various “people-finding” websites will start pulling aggregated .tel contact information for an up-to-date Technorati like directory. Not only will this directory be up-to-the-minute accurate, but it will also updated by the person or company themselves instead of third party sources such as phone listings.
With the proliferation of wireless devices and networks, it has become imperative that people are able to convey their locations to associates and customers as and when needed. The .tel website envisages doing exactly that. Telnic officials say that instead of the tedious process of hunting up a friend’s number, it would be easier to remember the .tel address. But critics say that the addition of another domain will just serve to confuse people rather than make their tasks easier.
So like .mobi, the success or failure of .tel likes in its branding since, literally, .tel does not do anything that a .com website cannot. Its just a matter of whether or not people find it easier or helpful think about going to a .tel domain instead of the “contact” link on a companies or person’s webpage.
The ability to send SMS or instigate phone calls from a web page (what I call teleweb) has been a while for a while now but has not yet really taken off. The ability to send SMS or allow click to call functionality are not yet standardized and require in depth knowledge of modules, bulk SMS providers and VoIP.
The marketing advantages of such technology are more than obvious.
One thing is for sure .tel may just be lead to the tele-web explosion that the telecommunications and VoIP companies have been looking for.
Ebay’s recently acquired Skype acquired some startups of their own today. Skype is paying 27 million in Ebay stocks for San Francisco based VoIP startup Sonorit Holdings and its U.S. subsidiary, Camino Networks. Skype co-founder and CEO Niklas Zennstrom said the acquisition gives his firm access to “some of the leading experts in online voice engineering.” But what it really gives Skype an edge on (and the reason why I am blogging about it here on MOpocket) is the mobile VoIP revolution. You see, Sonorit Holdings and its subsidiary Camino specialize on VoIP for mobile networks and as we have heard rumors of time and time again, the mobile universe is one that Skype has had its eye on for a long time now.
This should come as no big surprise.
A while back I reported on how Skype planned on testing its functionality on Hutchison Whampoa’s carrier 3. “3″ in Sweden already offers Skype bundled with a 3G data card and flat-rate data plan.
Skype is already available on Windows Mobile devices and a company called EQO Communications allows Apple OSX users to access their Skype while on the road.
And if none of this convinces you of Skype’s plans then a quick WHOIS search on the domain name www.skypemobile.com will show you in what direction Skype is looking to head. For now visiting the site merely mirrors Skypes main site, but the acquisition of both the domain and mobile VoIP experts (along with other buzz signs) only goes to show that Skype has big plans when it comes to the Mobile VoIP Revolution.
How this will effect the carries we will have to wait and see.
Welcome to the 21st Carnival of the Mobilists!!! It is an honor to be hosting this weeks Carnival of the Mobilists here at MOpocket! Its hard to believe that the Carnival is now 21 which means, to remind my European readers, that the Carnival can now legally partake in alcoholic substances and download pornography in the United States! Just in time for the Gathering of the Mobilists over at CTIA in sin city Las Vegas! Which I have just been told by Rudy via Skype is now booked.
Any-who, thanks for all those that submitted articles to this weeks coming of adult age (american version) Carnival of the Mobilists! There is some really top notch writing this time around so lets get started.
MOBILE + SOCIETY
First off, Mr Rheingold over at Smart Mobs posts about a really interesting interview that he and Mimi Ito gave on Keitai (thats japanese for mobile phone) culture, a favorite subject of mine.
MOBILE MARKETING
Troy Norcross over at consumer-preference.com’s mobile marketing and spam blog tells it like it is when it comes to concerns over mobile marketing for children. Go Troy! Protect our kids!
While we are on the subject of kids, check out Stowe Boyd’s blog in which he, citing two of our very own mobilists) chimes in on the extremes of cellphone identity from both ends of the spectrum.
WOMEN IN MOBILE
Rudy from M-Trends continues the much needed Woman in Mobile series with a tribute to Judy Breck a digital integration genius who is doing many wonderful things for this world. He’s got a way with mobile women I tell ya….
OPERATOR/CARRIERS
Ok, there are two really good posts about EU’s decision to Ban Roaming charges. The first comes from Ian Wood (aka the Digital Evangelist) in which he discusses what good can come of all this (besides not having to pay tariffs while roaming). Then, Tomi T. Ahonen of the communities dominate blog chimes in with some ideas of his own on what the carriers should be doing now.
MOBILE APPLICATIONS
The boys over at Mobhappy have a nice little piece on the “Free Stuff for Advertising” phenomena and how it is infiltrating the mobile space. Russell thinks its not so pretty.
In her usual fun but elegant style Darla Mack of the same named darlamack blog shows the signs the an SMS explosion is on the cusp here in the States as more and more SMS services are being displayed on adds and by adds but how, already, its being taken over by the 1-900 sluts and hunks who all want to text with you for only 99 cents. Can you txt dirty?
APPLE STUFF
Dennis’ from Wap Review sent in a post that as a Mac user i enjoyed immensely. I am surprised to, now that I think about it. What will it take for more Apple specific mobile sites to pop up… an Apple Phone?
Everyones favorite Pondering Primate (one day you will have to tell us where all this monkey business came from) The Vanilla Gorilla thinks so with his post on the potential of Apple’s move into the mobile sphere and the possibility of them becoming a mobile marketing powerhouse.
POLITICS
Lady Xen that cute Klonie Israeli from over at Xellular Identity ponders real political SMS voting. For people really interesting in this subject also check out what a company called Mobile Voter is doing regarding SMS voter registration here in the States… via Textually
TECHIE STUFF
Daniel Taylor over at Mobile Enterprise Weblog writes a treatise on the role of IT and the human IT management processes where he clarifies what he meant by a “Hobson’s Choice for enterprise IT” in an earlier carnival post.
Ajit Jaokar from over at open gardens writes about how Ajax will will replace both J2ME and XHTML as the preferred platform for mobile applications development.
Well, thats everyone. If you think I left you out let me know
Before I get to to my post and my choice post of the week I just want to say how great it is to be a part of this mobilists community. All of you have been so nice in helping me and MOpocket out during these its early days and your kindness and advice have meant the world to me. I have enjoyed meeting those of you who I have met and am very much looking forward to meeting those of you that I have not yet met
MY CHOICES
Ok, my choice post of the week goes to a new blog in general. I want to introduce my fellow mobilists to the newest addition to the mobilist weblog world… mobileactive.org a community of activists dedicated to exploring ways of using the mobile medium for social good and other types of activism. Of particular post importance please check out Ken Bank’s (the founder of FrontlineSMS) post on riding the MobileActive wave.
FROM MOpocket
As for my post of the week I want everyone to take a look at my my post (and I am sorry Dorrian for not having done this sooner) on an amazing new SMS service and technology here in the states called Mozes.
If you are in the UK don;t forget to help end the Seal Hunt by texting the word “Ban It” to 60123 (more info)
Well, thats all! See some of you at CTIA!
Next weeks carnival of the Mobilsists is at Helen Keegan’s Musing of a Mobile Marketer (no rest for us CTIA wanderers, we are hardcore mobilists!)
The Carnival invites new writers about mobile as well as old friends to participate - you don’t need a special invite. Send your entry no later than next Wednesday, April 5th at 9PM PST to: mobilists@gmail.com. And, if you have any feedback about any of the posts, the idea behind the Carnival, or its format or style, please leave a comment as we’d love to hear from you. For more information regarding the Carnival of the Mobilists visit here.
Thats all and thanks for visiting and remember to come back often!
This coming Tuesday and Friday (March 7th and 8th) The Institute for Politics Democracy and the Internet (IPDI) will host their sixth successful Politics Online conference. For those of you not familiar with the event, it is one of the countries top bipartisan politics and technology conferences that attracts over 600 politicos from all over the political spectrum (next to The Personal Democracy Forum event... which I hear is working on a mobile section as well:-)). In the past, the conference has been dominated by themes big in the online world such as political websites, online fundraising and most recently Blogs. But this year, based on their successful Politics-2-Go event,(which I helped consult them on) they are, for the first time, incorporating the mobile medium and telephony into the mix of technology for politics discourse.
I will be speaking at the event and will be blogging it over at Personal Democracy Forum.
Yes, There Is a Free Sample at the End of this post.
One day, I called the cell phone of a potential client and was shocked when the call was picked up by a PBX system. A kind woman asked “Who may I ask is calling?” After I gave my name she asked me to please hold as she tried to locate the person who I was trying to call. Then I was introduced to some beautiful classical music while I waited. Meanwhile, (and I did not know this at the time) three different phones of my potential client where ringing at the same time with my call. The first phone to pick it up answered the call. My potential client heard who the message was from and luckily decided to take my call.
The service is provided by a company called Phone Fusion and while I have seen and played with other PBX one number solution like services for mobile and or personal use (and played around with a couple at 3GSM)… this is the first solution I have seen that is both easy to use, feature rich and sold directly to the consumer.
I spent a good 3 hours speaking with the companies founder Jonathan Hollander over the phone as he guided me through the service features both online and via phone call examples. If you ask him what telephony category Phone Fusion fits into he will tell you without flinching that it’s all about “Unified Communication,” a category that is more and more needed as more and more modes of communication thrust upon us. The theme and demand for such services and technology appears to be springing up. I mean, think about how many different ways you can be contacted. I know you can Skype me, AIM me, Email me (on 5 different addresses..,. I’m on flickr, myspace, dodgeball and friendster and you can call me on my American cell, my European cell, my LAN line and my VoIP line (not to mention you can also text me on both my cells). I swear, one day I was sitting at home watching TV while working on the computer and was contacted by all of the above within a minute of each other?
Some may argue that cell phone convergence is moving toward a unified solution and they would be right, but this is only half the truth. Cell phone convergence allows me to access my Instant Messaging and email and social networks all on one device but they are still all diversified points of contacts. Plus, the cell phone number (for talking :-)) is only one of the 5 telephone numbers I associate with myself with. Phone Fusion is a first step toward making communication life a little easier. Simply put it’s a simple service that keeps you in control with just one phone number. You are given a permanent telephone number to give to your clients, colleagues, family or friends. Once this number is dialed, PhoneFusion contacts you anywhere you choose to be contacted, whether you are in the car, at home, leaving a client meeting, at the office or anywhere else in the world.
For a busy guy like me, always traveling with multiple numbers Phone Fusion’s “unified communication” concept would allow me to manage all of my incoming calls “like a virtual secretary” no matter what type of phone line (cell phones, land lines, VoIP lines and even faxes) I am on. “It’s cellphone agnostic,” Jonathan jokes over the phone, “even if you live on your cell phone.”
I also think think would be a really nifty tool for political campaigns that are always on the road.
I think that, in the very near future, we will start seeing a lot of “unified communication” solutions from already existing carriers, first targeted toward business men and then eventually even to the general public.
The company offers 4 different plans, a Standard service ($9.95 m), a Deluxe service ($15.95 m), a Premium service ($29.95) and a “Virtual Attendant” service (a virtual PBX like system) which can be added on to any Deluxe or Premium service for an extra 19.95 a month and thus allow business subscribers to sound like a professional company and have phones with all the same features as an expensive phone system for one low monthly payment…without all the expensive equipment.
With any of the services what you get is a phone number in your area code that will find you or follow you wherever you go as well as allow you to upload custom music for when you place your caller on hold, record all calls as well as the ability to transfer a call seamlessly between any type of phone (VoIP, Mobile or Lan) as if it was on the same network. You also get conference calling which allows you to create “virtual conference rooms,” as well as the basics such as voice mail, voice screening Call Guard and Caller ID Announcement. Your Phone Fusion number can even be used to send and receive faxes which are sent directly to your email or can be viewed online as a PDF.
The online interface, besides being a little bit java script heavy, is extremely easy to maneuver around with clear indications on how activate certain functions as well as what certain things mean. Subscribers can forward calls to as many as 4 numbers of any kind of phone (more numbers can be added at extra cost) and transfer freely between them at any time. hone Fusion forward grips the callers caller ID so that if your phone is equipped with Caller ID technology you will see the person calling number on all phones instead of your phone fusion number. Picking up the call on any phone will cause the other phones to stop ringing and at which time you will hear a recorded message of the person trying to contact you. You can than choose to accept the call, send a recorded message back to the person saying that you will call them back in a little bit or send the call to voice mail. And the voicemail feature is really neat in that phone fusion emails it to your desired email address in the form of a wav file. Messages can, of course, be checked using your phone but I kind of like the idea of being emailed my voice mail and having a stored copy of them on my computer (the same service applies for the “recording conversation” feature by the way… all conversations can be recorded up to one hour and then emailed directly to you when finished… large files are automatically divided up).
You can even make outgoing calls from phone fusion. While its still not as simple as just picking up a phone and dialing (with the exception of a certain feature available on the deluxe and premium packages which I will get to in a moment) the most immediate option is to call your own phone fusion number and enter the necessary pin to get into your account. One of the options enables you to enter a number in which to call. Calls can also be made via the web. In the example above, all I did was enter the number of which phone I wanted to use and the number I wished to call and pressed enter. In no time at all, my phone rang and when I picked it up it immediately started ringing the number I wished to call. The number the other person sees on their caller ID, by the way, is your Phone Fusion number and not the number of the phone I am actually using.
Now, it is important to point out that Phone Fusion is a telephony service and that beyond the monthly service fee you must also pay for time spent chatting when a call is connected via Phone Fusion. But these fees are anywhere from 5 cents a minute for incoming calls and 4 cents a minute for outgoing calls (these fees are more if you enable forwarding to an international number). What this means, is that if you pick up with a cell phone you well be using your mobile minutes as well as paying by the minute for fusion. The only exception to this is if you activate international forwarding and and answer a Phone Fusion call on a European cell phone, in which case who will only be paying the cost per minute for Phone Fusion’s international forwarding (which, by the way, is much cheaper then roaming on a GSM American cell phone when abroad. The problem with the international solution, of course, is that it is still not as easy to make a call at Phone Fusion prices. If a subscriber is away from a broadband connection (to instruct Phone Fusion to call your phone to make a call), he or she would have to dial into there American Phone Fusion number and would thus be paying for a long distance call on a international (probably pay as you) number. Jonathan tells me that they are working on a method that would enable a subscriber to have Phone Fusion call them back via a quick call or SMS command.
Now, don’t get me wrong, there are plenty of companies that offer this same type of multiple call forwarding solution, but what differentiates Phone Fusion from the rest (say like Area775) is that it is one of the first of its kind (in the direct to consumer market) to also incorporate (in its Deluxe and Premium packages) a complete VoIP package that concentrates on the theme of “unified communication.” In other words… instead of signing up with Vonage or other VoIP providers you sign up with Phone Fusion and the (pay as you go) number you get with Phone Fusion VoIP is the one number that also accesses Phone Fusions unified communication solution. What impressed me more was to learn that Phone Fusion and its Phone Box Etc technology is partly built upon a customized version of Asterisk, the open open source PBX server software coded by Mark Spencer, which means it lacks the limitations that other corporate built solutions often find themselves stuck in. Using Asterisk and thus avoiding things like pocket switches etc frees up Phone Fusions storage standards and provides them with infinite room for growth. In this sense, Phone Fusion is picking up where a lot of VoIP services leave of (acting a lot like an MVNO) or as Jonathan likes to refer to it, “we are essentially Voice Over IP on steroids.”
What’s next? A Phone Fusion cell number?
For those of you that want to try out the service for yourself, the nice guys at Phone Fusion provided me with a code to give to MOpocket readers so that you can try out the service for one month, free of charge.
For those of you who, like me, went out and bought a Nokia E70 (or many of the other Nokia wifi phones) you may have come across some of its Internet calling capabilities. Buying an unlocked one here in the States there is little one can do with it… however the Mobile Internet calling is slowly becoming the phenomena that I think will radically change and shake up the industry.
