Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

Ken Rutkowski, with whom I co-host the daily "World Technology RoundUp" on KenRadio pointed me to a story today in Nikkei Electronics Asia quoting Louis Holder of Vonage on the subject of E911.

While basically rehashing what Vonage has been saying on this subject since it began offering a method to reach the emergency services like police, fire and ambulance, the placement of the story and the timing says more about global expansion and where they are headed by Vonage simply by not saying it at all.

While all the USA Telcos are now going to go after the USA customers of each other, Vonage is going outside the border to bring business in.

Stay connected,

Andy Abramson

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

Uber blogger and Business 2.0 correspondent Om Malik has drawn attention to the next wave of rural broadband in his blog today.

I tend to agree with him, as rural America represents a huge underserverd market. Add together Fixed Broadband like was done on the island of Maui by Maui Sky Fiber with Voice over IP and a whole new way of being and staying connected occurs.

Next generation services would sprout up, for if you’ve ever worked in places in rural America like I have, the need for Internet access and a phone connection could easily be served by this technology.

Here in California there is the Skyweb Alliance made up of three regional wireless broadband networks that provide coverage to over 60 percent of the Golden State’s territory.

Wireless broadband, which had a lull when LMDS and MMDS services petered out, are making a resurgence. Add in VoIP and watch it grow.

Stay connected,

Andy Abramson

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

After looking at the blogs out there I decided that it’s time to start one on Voice Over IP and share my views on the a subject that will be hotly discussed in 2004 and beyond.

When I’m not writing and posting to this BLOG, I’m also covering Voice Over IP at KenRadio on the daily “World Technology Roundup” or on our weekly show, “Speculations.”

So, if Voice Over IP has your interest, this is the place to be.

Cheers,

Andy Abramson

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

It seems Vonage is quietly developing some newer technology that enables third party development of tools to make their service even more useful, according to the BroadbandReports.com web site.

While we’ve yet to validate the service, it sure sounds like their development group is trying to stay ahead of the competition. New players are about to make a run at them (Broadvox, VoicePulse and more) so steps like this enable them to keep their market position.

Now only if they would allow any SIP gateway to work on their network.

Stay Connected,

Andy Abramson

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

I’ve been playing with the softphones that are out there with the carriers I’m currently subscribed to.

Overall, the easiest to use are from Vonage. Delta Three’s iConnectHere service or Jeff Pulver’s Free World Dial Up’s customized softphone client, X-Ten Light.

All that said, the X-Ten Pro softphone may provide the most functionality of all. While it’s not free, I’ve been trialing it and have been able to configure it for both Free World Dial Up and iConnectHere once I got the set up instructions from the founder of X-Ten.

As far as handsets go, the Clarisys i-750 is about the best there is. Built in speakerphone, USB port and a touch tone dialer makes it so easy to use.

What all this means is staying connected keeps getting easier and less costly. The per minute pricing ranging from free this month with FWD or .2 cents per minute for up to 500 minutes with Vonage. As someone who remembers .13 cent per minute rates in the nineties and higher before that, the cost of telephone service is being driven down to a point of where it virtually costs nothing. Services are where the money will be made in the future.

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

Xeni Jardin in Wired Magazine’s, January 2004 edition provides a very entry level review of some of the Voice Over IP Services that are out there but leaves out some of the players and totally excludes how to get the Voice onto the Internet.

By lumping Vonage, Sipphone, Skype and Free World DialUp together and not explaining to users how they services differ Jardin has tried to present apples and oranges in the same bowl. The need for and ATA or a Softphone, the fact that Skype is really a first generation voice presence tool, and less of a VoIP platform as it currently lacks the ability to terminate a call on PSTN, which all the rest either can, do, or have the ability to do, also adds to the thinness of the story.

Lastly, other players like Packet 8, VoicePulse and iConnectHere were left out, and those three already do what Vonage does.

Source: gigaom.com

T-Mobile and iPass announced a distribution deal that will allow iPass customers to roam onto the T-Mobile Wi-Fi network. T-Mobile research shows that 88% of their wi-fi hotspots are used for business. While I-Pass’ whole business model is built around enterprise-level connectivity, ease of use and security. Add two and two and you get 22 here.

“T-Mobile has been very aggressive in building and promoting what is now North America’s largest single commercial Wi-Fi network,” said John Yunker of Pyramid Research. “By including locations such as airports and Kinko’s, the T-Mobile thinking is right in-line with the iPass business-oriented venue approach to building its virtual Wi-Fi network for the enterprise.”

With this deal, iPass ends up with well over 10,000 hotspots under contract. Ipass PR claims that is more than Boingo and GRIC’s “under contract” hotspots combined. By adding the more than 3,900 (to grow by 800 by end of year) T-Mobile hotspots in the United States, iPass will grow its USA hotspot footprint, currently at 1,551, by 350 percent.

Now that is something which truly makes sense. I think we need more of these companies to start working together, and provide at least seamless coverage.