Source: solokay.blogspot.com

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

AOL has been behind SIP for over three years or more. They are not jumping on board now. They are simply using what little they have left to SPIN this. Alec pretty much nailed it here as did Ken Camp.

What’s really here?…and more importantly, is anyone going to use a platform which is:

1) Pricier?

2) One way calling?

3) May not be there in six months?

Over the past 18 months the entire Voice team at AOL has been cut layer by layer and dismantled. Their mobile group also.

What’s more, before that AOL made a big deal about the Vonage/CallVantage Competitor (whatever it was called) then canned that, leavingcustomers hanging. Why? Could it have been Time Warner Cable. Rumor has it they didn’t want AOL to have a major voice play and guess what?

TWC looks like they have won that battle as the triple play only helped inflate their revenues.

So now at a time when TWC is being spun out someone says "oh, now we can launch voice again because they are no longer our big brother."

Caring about SIP and developers? I don’t think so. If there isn’t an advertisement in the window, AOL/TimeWarner can care less. It’s that simple.

AOL had the opportunity, the platform and the people. Now all they have is a bunch of code, some infrastructure and a team that’s hanging on to keep their jobs or have something to put on their resume.

Alec and Bill Volk have both heard the promises,,,,what has been delivered? ????

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

Alec gets up to bat and swings a heavy club this morning as he lays out his perspective based on experience of working with AOL and their now apparently defunct AIM PhoneLine developer program.

His event by event account isn’t a pretty picture and should be noticed.

It should make for an interesting Sqawk Box today.

Technorati Tags:
AOL

Source: gigaom.com

Source: gigaom.com

Source: andyabramson.blogs.com

Based on what I’m hearing all the third party apps are now gone…….

Source: voipcentral.org

AOL has launched its AIM Calling Out service, using which the customers can make international calls to nearly 200 countries from their landline or mobile phones. It is of course a paying service and applicable to non-American customers only. Check out how much you need to pay for a per-minute call.

You just need to download and install the latest AIM version to access the AIM Call Out service. There is no installation fee. Then, you need to enter the phone number of your foreign friend and then click the dial. It is very simple. In a nutshell, the AIM Call Out service is just like Jajah VoIP.

In any case, AOLs VoIP run has met premature death in the past. The last time, we have reported here shut down of Total Talk.

Should the launch of AIM Call Out be considered as AOLs reentry into VoIP market?

Image: AOL

Source: snapvoip.blogspot.com

ISP planets Alex Goldman has released a ranked list of VOIP providers based of subscribers for 3rd quarter 2006. From the list, It seems mostly Cable companies are beating the rest of the providers, except Vonage, Skype, and Sunrocket. This is from a list of 12 providers whose data is publicly available. The report also mentions that many providers are left out due to unavailability of data.
Here are the first five from the list; follow the link below to get the rest and read the report.

1 Vonage 2,000 [as of September 30, 2006]
2 Skype 1,800 (paid VoIP only, worldwide, date of this number unknown)
3 Time Warner Digital Phone* 1,649 [November 1, 2006]
4 Comcast Digital Phone* 1,348 [October 26, 2006]
5 CableVision 1,101 [November 8, 2006]

ISP Planet have done this ranking since 2004. The history of ranking is also available.

Links;
VOIP Service providers ranked
VOIP ranking History

Source: voipcentral.org

VoIP is shinning but the service providers are waning. Is this the latest development occurring around the VoIP world? According to a study conducted by MyVoIPProvider points out at least 85 service providers have left the market in the last 15 months.

Although, VoIP has been witnessing rapid growth in the past two years with subscribers base touching sky-high throughout the world, the service providers fail to click in the market.

It is not the case with the small brands or new entries, even the big brands are still struggling in the crowded Voice market. Take the case of AOL. The American most reputed brand had been forced to close down its Total Talk service less than 12 months after its launch.

MyVoIPProvider explains,

Without a significant differentiator or very deep pockets for marketing to create an online and offline presence it will be very difficult to survive in this extremely competitive market with call termination costs dropping rapidly and squeezing margins.

For full coverage

Source: voipcentral.org

The government of India has permitted California-based Internet giant Yahoo! to offer VoIP services for the Indian users of its Instant Messenger.

Although, Yahoo! has a strong base in India for its enormous web-based services like mail, searching and portals through its Yahoo! India, the company has decided to form a special company, Yahoo Internet Communication India to bring VoIP services, a spokesperson of Yahoo! India explained.

India is now a potential market for VoIP. With large numbers of Indians are living abroad, their families and relatives are keen to keep touch with them through VoIP service as it offers them free or inexpensive international call facilities.

On the other hand, India has experienced mushrooming growth in the number of Internet users. As per the latest count, the total number of online users in India is 37 million and the number will go on increasing in the coming days.

What is interesting to note the fact that the number of active users (people who use Internet at least once in a month) has touched to 25 million in September from 21.1 million in March 2006.

Therefore, the major Internet service providers are now betting on India for VoIP revenue. Yahoo! is the frontrunner of them. Like Yahoo, anther broadband giant AOL has also decided to launch its VoIP services and Instant Messaging in India.

Via:[Infoworld]

Source: voipcentral.org

After shutting down its much-hyped TotalTalk service, AOL is now eyeing on the global Voice market with adding new features to its Instant Messaging Application (AIM), although the US online service provider has registered very negligible number of non-American customers towards its messaging service.

However, with the close down of TotalTalk ATA VoIP solution, AOL has now a plenty of resources to expand its VoIM solution (Voice over Instant Messaging) that comes with AIM Phoneline.

AOL is intended to bring three application programming interfaces (APIs) to enable developers to build systems like personalize the AIM Phoneline service by adding ringback tones and ring tones for frequent callers and provide call management functionality into the AIM Phoneline service.

AIM Phoneline provides a telephone number to subscribers free of charge. The company also releases a pay-version of its AIM service, which provides users unlimited calls to US and 30 countries worldwide for $14.95 per month.

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Source: voipcentral.org

AOLs (America Online) VoIP run comes to a surprising end with its decision to close down the much-talked TotalTalk service just one year after its launch in North America.

A company spokesperson explained that the service will be terminated in October due to a pretty challenging and competitive market. It might be a major factor for the US-based broadband service providers to drop the service.

In fact, in these days the VoIP market is witnessing throat-cut competition due the entry of new players and fresh offers from the established players.

Therefore, AOL, Yahoo!, MSN and Google feel it secure to go for IM route than to stand before the VoIP service providers like Vonage, SunRocket, 8×8 and Verizon.

However, an Aswath post said that their page might have been hijacked since other pages like sign-up page seem to be working normally.

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