VoIP Watch

30+ Ways To Find Your WiFi

Mashable has a great list of tools and sites that help you stay connected and Working Anywhere.

Vringo Grabbing Headlines

Client Vringo had a pretty good week with two very nicely written stories.

Business Week and Download Squad.

The Business Week story has a very homeland feel, written by their correspondent in Israel tells how the company was started and what the future looks like. This is great for potential partners and for carriers to read as it tells how Vringo can fit into their plans.

Download Squad's piece, written by Ted Wallingford, gives a very easy to grasp consumer's understanding of what Vringo is about.

Both are great reads and very timely.

Technorati Tags: Sprint, Nokia, N90, N95

In the Media-Stay plugged in on the road and in the air

Part of the fun of being a quotable blogger is seeing yourself in print. Today Paige Wiser of the Chicago Sun Times has a story that really helps people figure out how to be working anywhere, and guess what? I'm quoted.

Over 30 VoIP Services At Mashable

Check out the nifty compilation over at Mashable that profiles many of your favorite VoIP related services.

Technorati Tags: Skype, VoIP

Why Some Innovate And Die

The Purple Wonder himself, Mr. VON, has a very good post about innovation. But Jeff, please don't think you are alone in this battle. Others of us like David Beckemeyer (PhoneGnome), Alec Saunders (iotum), Jeff Bonforte (Yahoo), Craig Walker (GrandCentral), Luca (Abbeynet), Michael Robertson (SIPPhone), Jim Tobin (Comcast), Jeff Black and John Todd (TalkPlus), Surj Patel (eTel's conference chair), AOL's Sr. VP of Voice Services Ragui Kamel and even I have been on this same kick for about as long (even if some of us weren't blogging back in 2002.)

But rather than take a purple sky view through mauve colored glasses, something we all have been guilty of more than once, let's start with where the problems actually lays. A fundamental lack of knowing how to market to consumers that exists in so many companies that are trying to bring consumer products and services to market today.

Here are some thoughts on this which may likely cause discussion, some discomfort, some angst and even some indigestion…but better over a blog post than over one’s career or investment dollars I figure.

1. To sell new and innovative products and services requires marketing, not just selling. And marketing requires real dollars. Demand either exists and that need can be satisfied, or demand has to be created. Marketing finds the need, and satisfies the want, by knowing how to tell the market why it needs it.

2. Most venture backed voice related companies are led by people who don't have a clue what it really costs to market a product or service to consumers. They have great ideas, but no experience.

3. The reason the cable MSO's are winning in VoIP over the upstarts is simple. They have all kinds of marketing and promotional inventory to use to get the attention of the customers. Backing a play without the right marketing dollars in the funding round is a recipe for disaster, unless owning the Intellectual Property is the play from the start.

4. It's not about selling in. It's about selling through. Too much time and energy is spent getting the deal, and not enough time is spent on what to do once the customer signs on. I call this the B2B2C paradox. You have the deal, but have no way to fufill it.

5. Most companies in the start up phase hire an experienced B2B marketer to get deals done. This is the same person, because of their success at getting the deals done, who ends up running the B2C business into the ground. Why? Because a real consumer marketer doesn't speak the right "tech speak" or VC speak language. There's a reason for that. The consumers don't either.

6. To continue the sell in vs. sell through point, to sell through means you need to know thy customer. To know thy customer means to conduct two types of research.

A. Primary, meaning you do it for your company directly with the customer segments and

B. Secondary, meaning you review what is publicly available from sources that matter and apply it.

I don’t know how many startups I have suggested hire a real consumer marketing company to help with market segmentation, usage and attitude studies and more. Few take us up on that offer. Why? Because their investors don’t take the time to understand how to take a new product to market, have never spent a day in consumer marketing at the face to face level or have almost no consumer marketing agency experience to know what is needed. The most successful companies we all know of all research how they research, constantly improving their processes. Who does this best? TV Networks. Packaged Goods companies and yes, even the established telcos. Funny, aren’t those the companies that online companies are trying to better..hmmm..

7. Not enough customer centricity...The products that get launched today are so non-customer centric it's scary. It’s not that consumers wouldn’t want to buy and use them, it’s just that they have too many challenges learning how and just give up.

How do you take a new product to market? By putting it in the hands of thousands of people in one-on-one and focus groups to find out what they think and then boil it down to where it is plain dumb simple to use. I don't know how many of the executives in the emerging VoIP plays have ever done a real focus group in their lives, or spent time selling to the public, but I do know that Level3 has done just that to enable their clients, mostly the Cable MSOs, to know more about what their customers want and it shows. Cable VoIP sales are up vs. the other guys, and Level3's stock is up. Someone at Level3 should give Cynthia Carpenter a huge raise for that study alone as she quarterbacked the project under the now departed to Verisign, Charlie (Two Buck Chuck) Meyers.

8. Distribution---the web is a lousy distribution outlet. I repeat. The web is a lousy distribution outlet.

The web is a great marketing channel for awareness and serves as a wonderful delivery vehicle via download or for order entries and sign up. So you ask, why isn’t it a great distribution outlet for everything? Well for starters it’s a lousy way to interact with consumers who have questions. FAQ files only frustrate the masses and you have to know exactly the right words to use the search tools.

Now compare this to going into a specialty retailer.

For starters when I'm in a specialty store I can get questions answered in real time from people who should have some product knowledge (okay CompUSA is the exception but they are a big box store without any specialty vs. Frys or Best Buy which actually trains people as product specialists.)

Most online services want the customer to email and then WAIT for a reply. Or worse, you call up, and experience what we all now accept as normal. A call to some outsourced service provider in some foreign land who doesn't even know what day it is, let alone have the basic level of product knowledge of a web page that does.

Compare this to QVC, HSN or even going to a Costco. There you get answers and you get service and it happens more often than not, almost right away.

9. Retail is still important.

Building retail distribution takes money. But having retail distribution will make you money. I'm continually amazed how clients and companies we interact with won't spend one day looking at how to get their products to retail, and yet will spend months trying to figure out how to optimize their web sites for higher Google rankings. Believe me. Selling services in 10,000 convenience stores sure made a lot of money for the calling card folks, so one has to wonder why no one is really pushing VoIP in Radio Shack or at the independent cellular stores let alone selling new services at 7-11.

10. Sample This--nothing works better than sampling. I'm continually amazed that services that offer trials don't do more sampling. Not on the web. Offline.

At start-ups the pressure to start showing uptake is enormous. But you can’t have uptake if you don’t reach you’re the potential customers. If they would sample more, in more places the awareness and uptake would be far greater

Heck anyone with an email account can keep sampling or keep trying free services online. What amazes me is the lack of sampling of a service where people are. People are not just at home on their PC's they are at events, in malls and on the street.

Apple gets this idea better than anyone with their Apple stores. Consumers come in and try out an iPod, a MacBook and then order from somewhere. For Apple the sales at Apple stores are a bonus. Secretly Apple doesn't care where you buy Apple products just as long as you buy Apple. The whole facade of exclusivity is just that. It's a cachet and Apple does it as well as a Ferrari or Porsche dealership can. Cisco practices a similar marketing approach. Buy from them. Buy Cisco from someone else, but at the end of the day, they are happy if you just bought Cisco (or Linksys.)

Nokia understand this too and with their Nokia World locations is taking the same approach. Show people what they didn’t know about. Let they try the product and then let them buy it there, on the web or anywhere, but just buy Nokia.

But the path to success has its failures. Gateway failed at this with Gateway Country stores, but it wasn't for lack of trying. It was because Gateway didn't have the rest of the retail market channels in place the right way. Before Apple launched Apple Stores they already had stores within other computer stores staffed by Apple people. Gateway didn’t. Oh.there’s that research thing coming up again. And oh, there’s that lack of sampling and trial. And oh, there’s that selling in, not selling through mentality at work.

Innovation isn’t dead. It’s being killed. And the killers are the people who give birth to the ideas by practicing the worst form of euthanasia. They kill off their young not because their idea isn’t right. Because they’re not the right people to innovatively market the idea.

In this changing game from where technology has gone from geeks to the general market, the time for innovation in marketing is here. To market innovatively takes money, or at least some clue.

Skype Subverts T-Mobile

Many a writer, analyst and blogger have put the label of “disruptive” on Skype.

I think NOT.

The proper term, as I have said before is “subversive” and what the following will prove and point to that exact claim. Now for those who don’t see the fine points of differentiation, disruptors upset the status quo. Michael Robertson at SipPhone, best known for MP3.com is an example of a premiere disruptor. Subversive types do an Al- Quada  type 9-11 unexpected attack and profit from it.

That’s exactly the category that Skype has to be taken in and always should be.

Not only did Skype set out to disrupt the market, something they have done, but with three independent moves, or what only on the surface would appear to be independent, Skype has subverted their own promotional partner, T-Mobile in a masterful way that I applaud.

Let me first give you the ingredients to this explosive recipe that is clearly inspired by one part “Alchemist’s Cookbook” and another part “Mini Manual For The Urban Guerilla” . The execution is pure asymmetrical marketing, a concept I not only subscribe to but applaud when I see it as it not only on the surface appears to be disruptive, but in the end subverts the very nature of the T-Mobile relationship.

It is pure genius and what’s more unless you looked at the sum of the parts, on the surface everything seems to be just what it is.

But it’s not.

Here are the ingredients

1)    Skype on Sony Mylo available for $349.00 at Best Buy
2)    Skype/T-Mobile Hotspot Free Access For a Year Promotion With The Mylo Upgrade NO CHARGE
3)    Skype Unlimited Calling for $14.95 for one year 

So what does this mean?

Well for starters for the crowd that goes to Starbucks with a cell phone, for what amounts to $365.00 you can make unlimited calls to your friends now who aren’t on Skype with a the Mylo which is also a very useful PDA, music player and lightweight web browse. You add in the free calling and all of a sudden for the hotspot connected, no-need for a mobile phone crowd, the same crowd that Earthlink covets and wants to attract, and you have the very first real salvo at the mobile phone industry, and in true subversive fashion, Skype used the industry’s own infrastructure, or at least T-Mobile’s for their very mission delivery vehicle. If you already have a Mylo this means it stops being a paper weight.

I’m not sure if Sony was a party to the Skype “Pearl Harbor” move on T-Mobile, but as someone who appreciates great execution in marketing, this is one for the books in how to take independent pieces of non-volatile elements and make something up that pure incendiary.

Ka-Boom!

Technorati Tags: Skype, VoIP

Kind Words

My mentor in PR, the late Sy Roseman, used to tell me that "self praise" stinks which is one reason why I don't have a real web site for my company, but more so, because it's who talks about you and what they say that matters.

That's why it was so it was very rewarding, and heartfelt, when I woke up today and read Matt Miller's very kind and emotionally packed commentary on the Washington Post's story that I was featured in. The fact that Matt posted this on ZDnet, giving it major props and eyeballs is reflective of him and his character.

Bloggers have come under all kinds of attacks, and now with the mainstream media recognizing, and in many ways adopting what we do, we're seeing that we and those that embrace blogging are not the aberration, but the harbinger of things to come.

The Line Between Blogging and RSS

I recently received a series of requests from some traditional media outlets asking me to add their VoIP feeds to my Blogroll. After a brief exchange with one of the best bloggers I know, Bob Cox, founder of The Media Bloggers Association and TheNationalDebate.com I was able to better articulate what I felt when I read the request.

These guys are clueless.

There is a big difference between a blogger and media outlets using RSS feeds for distribution. So while the company which shall remain nameless goes out suggesting links to their feeds would be good for my readers, and I should add them to my blog roll, it became even cleared how big media is missing what Blogging is all about.

Blogging is about a personal communication with your audience. I often say it's not how many, but who is reading your blog. The numbers only matter to advertising folks, not public affairs or PR experts. They know that influencing the right people is what it is all about.

Blogging is more like Direct Marketing than advertising. Since media companies are all about eyeballs, one needs to think more about the influence the blog has, than the traffic.

And to the company who asked for the "link," you'll get yours, in the stories "I" choose to highlight for that's why readers choose to use blogs. They want the filter and the insight that goes along with it.

Jon Arnold's Blog Launches and It's No Joke

Jon Arnold's Blog means Mark Evans now has some real competition in the Toronto area for blogging on VoIP.

If you don't know Jon, you should. He's freshly thawed from the team at Frost and Sullivan.

Blogging Changing Media

While not VoIP related, Today's New York Times has a story on how blogging is impacting the world of gossip in the media. In the past, when sources mattered, scoops were the key and reporters valued relationships and sought to build new ones, as one never knew where that would lead.

Today, reporters and editors seem to have lost the art of personal relationships for the most part, or are a lot more standoff like than in the days gone bye. Part of that falls on those in the PR trade as we've all relied too much on technology the last ten years or so and forgotten the art of the story, the relationship and the scoop. News also has become more instantaneous, making gossip seem more real, and the need for spin control more necessary.

As someone on all sides of the news, and who loves the right use of a rumor, this story is one more nail in the coffin of traditional media.

Credit Due and Deserved

A lot of media coverage has fallen on Vonage's complaints about Port Blocking by a couple of companies. The real credit goes to Paul Kapustka, who has been like a proverbial bloodhound on breaking and covering the story from its very start.

Kapustka, editor of Advanced IP Pipeline for CMP. He's been on the story ever since the first issue and always maintained a steady watch.

While Paul is not a Blogger, the line between journalism and blogging is very thin, and Kapustka always links to the blogosphere when stories there help with his writings.

Scam Deliverd By Skype

EuroTelcoblog's James Enck discovers a flaw in the Skype multi user chat system and waxes on about it.

One of the aspects of Skype I see is some type of social networking feature being overlayed with it. The Pulver Communicator already has this type of feature built in but until the type of trust system that is available with LinkedIn or ZeroDegrees type of operations, I don't think Skype should let this type of technology be authorized.

Why? Skype's firewall penetration technology is very good at poking the hole through the firewall and even though you trust your friend, I don't think third party trust is really there just yet.

Tehrani on The Blogging Panel

Rich had a few minutes to sit in on part of the Blogging Panel at VON. I appreciate the kudos and his recognition of the creative approach I took.

I'll have to come up with a gimmick for the next one, if Pulver's folks invite me back.

DoOM and GloOM from OM get's Countered

"Om, it's not dot-VOIP yet"....so says Canadian Mark Evans in his blog today. Om thinks the dot.com/dot.bomb era is hitting VoIP, and while some startups may become casualties, there are also more established companies in the space from top to bottom who are shifting to VoIP for telephony and the related business. While there is merit in some of what Om feels, there also is lot more savvy in the business world about technology.

For SBC Chief, AT&T Deal Is Essential in New Telecom Era

For SBC Chief, AT&T Deal Is Essential in New Telecom Era is a Q&A in today's Los Angeles Times.

I think the swipe at Vonage and other so called instant phone companies who can buy network access below cost and then resell and the comment about customers in Hong Kong really points to how important AT&T's CallVantage and VoIP overall was to this deal.

Clearly SBC is also gearing up for a name change. AT&T is clearly the logical choice because it has to have the higher recall in brand identity vs. SBC. I say it's time to invest in automobile and truck paint. Here's why.

My guess is the senior marketing folks (remember, Dorman is a marketer first) will evaluate at shareholder expense the options:

1. Stay SBC--this would be the second weakest way to go as the cost to build brand nationwide, but more importantly on a global basis (and we are in the era of the global telco brand) would be even more expensive. Don't forget AT&T just did a deal to sponsor some aspects of Formula One Grand Prix racing while they could easily transfer it to SBC, the ability to tell the story gets harder and more expensive.

2. Come up with a totally new name...NOT. This would be even more expensive and erode the equity in both brands. I mean, if they did come up with a new name, I think it would be ABC for American Bell Corporation, (oh, yes, some mouse house has that name in their portfolio--and I don't think they would be very sporting about giving it up) but while that makes some things cute, I don't think the expense of rebranding is worth the years it will take to build market acceptance.

3. Go with AT&T. It will cost less. It will score higher on the recall tests and it is at the front of all directory listings. What's more globally it still is the most known USA phone company.  The one thing I know is all the truck painting companies must be salivating right now. It's only been a few years here in California when the trucks went from Pacific Bell to SBC in look.

Bottom line. I just saved shareholder millions of dollars, as that's what would be spent on studies, research, analysis, focus groups and more, all before the first dime is dropped on new advertising and promotion.

Fractals of Change: Freedom to Communicate Conference

Fractals of Change: Freedom to Communicate Conference

So, where is Jeff Pulver? If anyone has been pushing the rights of the user and the industry it's Pulver. He should be on this distinguished list of experts.

Kudos for Time Warner and Business 2.0 for allowing Om Malik to participate. Normally magazine publishers hold tight reins on their writers, but this shows a lot of forward thinking policy.

Sadly I will be on out of the country when the fireworks happen in D.C.

Aswath Weblog: Bellster fwdOUT Revisited

Aswath Weblog: Bellster fwdOUT Revisited as usual Aswath weighs in on the Bellster, um, FWD:out issue with some keen insight...I'm glad Aswath will be on the Bloggers Panel in San Jose at VON. I wonder if I'll have to hire some of Jerry Springer's security folks to keep the sides from turning a friendly chat into "Family Feud."

EuroTelcoblog Gets Pissy With The Times

James Enck sell side analyst supremo when it comes to all things Telco in the EU and UK with his EuroTelcoblog gets pissy and rightfully so. I think I blogged this on Friday about Google. So while my knickers are as much in an uproar about this I have to agree with James that the old media is sure running on empty trying to keep up with the poptart, minute rice like impact of blogging.

The New York Times > Technology > Free Speech, or Secrets From Apple?

The New York Times > Technology > Free Speech, or Secrets From Apple?

This is why I'm a card carrying member of the Society of Professional Journalists and the Online Media Association. But, given I co-host two radio broadcasts now, and write a weekly wine column it's a little harder to say "he's not a journalist, he's a blogger."

I think bloggers, like analysts are journalists. They report facts, information and yes, rumors to the public. The only difference is some bloggers don't have editors. Heck few do.

Check Out Real Time

I think this new blog called Real-Time will be worthy of keeping an eye out.

The author writes for BCR (Business Communications Review) one of the best authorities in Enterprise IP Voice related topics and he's also with The Burton Group. Those two factors gives him instant credibility in my book.

Blogging Blahs

Of late I've had the blogging blahs...there is so much out there, but given the holiday season, it's a bit slower for me and I'm a tad distracted.

I've also had a back up system failure. The reliable Mirra box seemed to develop a bug, my system last week was hit by a Virus that came in via a manipulation of the Google toolbar. All in all, these two occurances have cost me time away from my real business and the blogging, both Wine and VoIP have suffered.

I should be back in gear next week. I bought a new Linksys device that lets me wire in two USB drives to the network and a Maxtor 300 GB drive. I need all the space because I don't want to put the digital video or audio files on the new Mirra that arrives next week. I want the iTunes and WMA files, plus Bit Torrent downloads of the BBC's show "Spooks" to be handy when I travel, without having to be on any one PC only.

I hope to have another story out on The Broadband Daily based on my "Nomadic" experiences over the last month or two...in the next week or so as well.

Keep on reading, I'm back !

Skype + Weblogs = Kazaa

One thing I missed with the Skype Kazaa announcement was the Weblog angle. Tied in with VoIP it's a very powerful motivation. Add in the Skype conferencing capability and you have a very interesting threat to traditional conferencing because of the file sharing aspect. This is dead on threat to the space Microsoft is hoping to own with their Live Conferencing product and why the bought Placeware last year.

If the motivation is to be another Yahoo or eBay, which Skype could easily form the centerpiece of, this move may be a tell tale sign.

Why I Don't Like Apple

I ordered the U2 Black and Red iPod the first few days it was offered. I was told it would ship on or around the 18th of November. Around that time Apple sent me an email saying that due to demand the item would not ship until early December.

I say B.S. The retailers are all getting their U2 iPods and the ads on TV are driving people to the stores.

Apple used the online demand to help support the sell in in order to predict where the demand was coming from. Should I have waited and went to Best Buy? Maybe. Since I bought it more for the coolness of the colors, than a real need for the iPOD I'm not as upset as some people may be.

But Apple has always had a problem meeting demand and that's what they do to drive demand. Short run, build up the secondary market and drive the buyers into as many stores as possible to get the product ordered so their numbers can look better the next quarter. It's all a stock or I should say out of stock game with that company. That's why I don't like them.

Not Blog Related--SPORTS

Very few of you know my history, and while it is not a well kept secret, at one point in my life, actually over half of it until 1988 was spent in the world of professional sports. That's right. I was a jock and a sports marketing executive. In junior high I played varsity soccer and club volleyball, plus box lacrosse in a league.

The saying for box lacrosse was "you gotta be mean to play box lacrosse." I wasn't mean, I was just good at it as I had some of the best trainers, coaches and players in the sport, including a few who are truely legends of the game in Canada.

After the demise of the Philadelphia Wings in 1976 who I worked for, and played for the Junior Wings, I was asked to work for the Philadelphia Flyers to promote youth hockey. Along the way I also became commissioner of the Delaware Valley Hockey League and the Mid Atlantic Women's Hockey League before rising to the post of USA Hockey Registrar at the age of 20. My peers then were all twice my age or older, so I learned a lot before most others. I'm not bragging. I was fortunate to have the opportunity.

As commissioner of sports leagues at age 18 or so, I was deciding the fate of players, coaches and parents of youth hockey players when the rules would be broken. Fortunately I had the good luck of having three very good mentors. The late Sy Roseman and Ken Gesner, along with longtime boss Aaron Siegel. All taught me different aspects of fairness, logic and obviously what's the best way to handle something.

Gesner, who was really like a second dad to me in many ways, as was Sy, had the uncanny ability to sense when a problem was brewing and cut it off at the knees in youth sports. I learned from him and in the DVHL I applied the same approach, leading the organization for many years and enabling it, and hockey to grow in the Philadelphia area, which was why I was working for the Flyers in the first place.

That's why I am so disgusted with the entire situation that occurred in a recent NBA game involving the Pacers and Pistons and the fans. I'm not a sports fan like I was when I was younger. The games have changed, and the players and fans are becoming thugs.

While the fan throwing the beer is clearly wrong, and the players who are paid to compete and entertain are also at fault, call it contibutory participation, my years in sports management in the Snider Empire, which is now part of Comcast-Specator taught me many things about player and crowd control.

First, I learned that athletes of character are what the Flyers were built on. Many a player with more skills was passed over in favor of personal traits leading off with character. Sure the Broad Street Bullies were tough and loved a fair fight in the 70s, but they did it as part of the game. They also respected the sport and their fans, sans an incident or two involving situations much akin to this one in Detroit on Friday. Second and more importantly from Aaron and his staff at the Spectrum I learned the secret of crowd control was strong and visible security and ushering. Always being vigilant and always having security anticipate before the crowds got involved.

What happened in Detroit is not uncommon. The was indeed an anomoly, which if not addressed now by David Stern will likely manifest itself over and over again.

Here's my educated guess as to what transpired and why...After a certain point in the event, usually the ushers leave. Their job is to get people to the seats when the doors open and when the game is in progress. Usually the ushers are sent home by the last quarter in a basketball game, leaving the Security Gurards to help get the crowd out. If you watch in the video you will see an absence of ushers as well security between the floor and the stands. This is the management of the building's decision and in this case, the team is owned by the same group that manages and operates the Palace of Auburn Hills.

It's called greed. And that's the real reason this happened. To create a more profitable business, owners, due to rising salaries, have to find ways to cut costs. In this case it took a black eye on basketball for all that to clearly manifest itself and show what greed by the players, agents and owners caused. Ayn Rand wrote "greed is good." She also wrote that Anti Greed is bad. Anti Greed is a form of greed that is control based. That's why I left sports. Because Anti-Greed was becoming obvious to me and the NBA were the leading proponents of it. That was back in 1988 after I went to work the Denver Nuggests where I learned first hand how the NBA did things, how David Stern ran things and why they were different than the way Ed Snider, a true objectivist in thought and business had guided the Flyers and in turn how I was taught.

David Stern has not had a situation this severe since the Michael Jordan gambling saga of years past, and unlike then when he reportedly had to ask MJ to step away for a few years before the truth came out, this one is front and center.

When Stern doles out the punishment, I hope the players get the lightest sentence. The owners of the Pistons, the managers of the facility and the head of security need to be brought to him and suspended too. For it was their efforts or lack of that likely also contibuted to the fiasco. The sale of beer may have been stopped earlier in the game, or maybe it wasn't. That's only a part of it.

Fans go to game to have a good time, but their safety has to be assured by the venue, not the NBA, but as the Commissioner Stern has to extend his reach beyond the court, or the criminal and civil courts will.

I'm not a Stern fan, but its time he publicly lives up to his last name and issues a Stern decision that is more than a Stern warning. The owners of the Piston are viewed as powerful in the league. He has to rise above all that or the game will have a black mark it doesn't need.

Customer Service Part 2

I want to thank all of you who have taken the time to be of support via your comments.

The Gateway LCD monitor situation got resolved on Monday, via the intervention of a Gateway VP of Client services and their Director of Call Centers. Seems about everything that could go wrong, did go wrong in the handling of the replacement.

The Typepad issues are getting fixed. My note to Six Apart's Mena Trott, Anil Dash and PR Pro Jane Anderson and post here got their attention and within hours I had a work around and attention. These are great people who I have gotten to know via my role as Senior Editor of KenRadio's World Technology RoundUp and most recently via Gadgetfest which I co-hosted and co-chaired for the San Diego Telecom Council.

The speed at which Gavin Trott and Anil Dash reacted, once I laid the smack down on them was almost immediate. Score one more for the blogosphere.

And that was the difference between Gateway and Six Apart. The Gateway experience took almost three weeks to get resolved and many phone calls, wasting hours of time. The TypePad issue took about five minutes of my time to stimulate resolution oriented activity to get in gear and to be communicated. I don't know if this would have been possible without the Blogosphere, and the TypePad technology I use.

Thanks for being my Support Group.

TypePad Buggy

Is anyone else having issues with TypePad? Over the past two weeks I have tried to do some long posts or tried to edit posts originatng via AudioBlog but Typepad is being naughty. This is likely a result of the so called Typepad upgrade to a new release and that's why I think I've had crashes, format errors and more. As a result I've lost some posts, or had to rewrite them. Since time is money, its impacting my blogging and I'm losing sleep. The funny thing is the original Typepad worked flawlessly. I even tried composing my blogs in Word and pasting them in, but ended up having to reformat them. I guess Notepad is next if I want to insure I can save my text before posting...OUCH. Since I'm a paying customer I hope they realize that we don't pay to beta test. Let me know if your having the same issues...

Blog Slow Down

It's one of those days. I got back late Tuesday from San Francisco, have been drinking lots of wine since last Sunday with dinners I've organized. Call the wounds self inflicted. I'm also catching up on work, business and personal life beyond the blog.

Mostly I've been getting my house in order. I hate clutter and while my laptop is perfectly organized all this darn paper that seems to accumulate is overwhelming.

I hired a PA. That's Personal Assistant, so lots of my day is spent with her on organizational issues. Once that's done I want to build a really cool office set up with all the latest and greatest tech toys at work.

Oh yes, I love the new Samsung printer that I got at Office Depot. I have been printing more.

As for VoIP, I now have all three WiFi phones working. VoicePulse, BroadVoice and Net2Phone. I'll start more comparative testing next week. That will be followed by some testing of all the TA's I now have from Vonage, AT&T, Packet8, BroadVoice and VoicePulse. Anyone else want in?

Bloggercon Thoughts

When you come to a conference like Bloggercon you get to meet some really neat people. Adam Curry's talk which was really leading a discussion about Podcasting was interesting. It got me thinking about how long Ken Rutkowski and I have been doing the World Technology RoundUp, now almost six years together and ten or so for Ken.

The revolution when it comes to news will not be televised. It will be blogged. Podded, texted and webcasted. Its all on the web. Tune in or tune on...

Bloggercon Thoughts

When you come to a conference like Bloggercon you get to meet some really neat people. Adam Curry's talk which was really leading a discussion about Podcasting was interesting. It got me thinking about how long Ken Rutkowski and I have been doing the World Technology RoundUp, now almost six years together and ten or so for Ken.

The revolution when it comes to news will not be televised. It will be blogged. Podded, texted and webcasted. Its all on the web. Tune in or tune on...

BloggerCon Stream

If you want to tune into what's happening at BloggerCon III from Stanford just listen to the webcast.

BloggerCon Dinner

I'm off to BloggerCon's opening night dinner at Mings in Palo Alto. Longtime friend, former client and all around smart guy Bob Cox of The National Debate is enroute with the wheels to get us there.

Bob is one of the brightest guys I know. Notre Dame, University of Chicago. Some smart media company looking to get serious about blogs should just hire him. He's got the blogosphere nailed down tight, understands the tech, and clearly understands them. His consultant days of Booz, Allen and Hamilton gives him a edge too. He can think and then do it. Not many in that world can...

BloggerCon In Palo Alto

I just received word that I'm now officially registered in BloggerCon 3. I booked my flight and have scored my Hotel rooms.

I'm looking forward to seeing who else from the Telecom blog world makes it there. This is not about VoIP, but all about the power and the future of blogging.

DemoMobile.Mobileblogging

Now this is cool. It's not VoIP related but this is so, so sweet. The folks who make TypePad, Six Apart and Nokia have teamed up to enable Mobile blogging easily.

So yesterday after seeing the demo at DemoMobile 2004 I rushed to the booth and had a chat with Nokia's Charlie Schick and Mena, the founder of Six Apart about Mobile Blogging. Mena beamed me the Mobile Blogging application, which is still in late Beta, Charlie explained how this all came about, and after fidlling with the settings for my Typepad account, then calling T-Mobile this morning, I joined the Mobile Blogging generation.

This will be a huge thing for me. I've always hated the time involved in taking pictures, then having to go to my PC, do the uploading from the camera when I'm on trips. What's great about this service from Six Apart is I can have multiple blogs set up on the phone (my spanking new Nokia 7610) and then via GPRS -- in this case the T-Mobile T-Zones, send a photo with limited text, which, I can then edit later.

The vision of blogging for fun, as well as business was always here. I discussed audioblogging with Mena and Charlie, with the idea of being able to send a FastChat message to the blog, versus how it would have to be done currently.

I'm stoked, and headed back today, for more Mobile Photo Blogging....Six Apart---You Rock ! Thanks Mena.

I Got GigaOm'd In Good Way

Om Malik, whom I respect as much as any journalist for his unbiased coverage of all things broadband has some nice things to say about my comments on Blogs and Media, as well as VoIP Watch. Thanks Om.

VoIP and The Media

A major market newspaper called me this week to talk about VoIP. I did the interview and now they want to send a photographer, so hopefully the story runs soon

The questions centered largely around my customer experience with VoIP, many of which have been chronicled here and on the “World Technology Roundup” which I usually co-host with Ken Rutkowski and Jason Romney. It also seemed to focus on the portability and cost savings of VoIP, but in fairness to the reporter, I won’t go into the details, for I sense he’s doing his homework quite diligently based on the questions he asked.

That prompted my thinking it’s time to get up on the soapbox.

As you may know, my experience with Vonage has been mixed. Sometimes the call quality is good, other times it leads something to be desired, possibly due to my having an early release CISCO ATA-186 they supplied. With AT&T’s CallVantage, no one even knows I’m using VoIP, and in the two and a half or so months I’ve been using it, I’ve yet to find a flaw with their service quality, sans one situation that I expect is caused by a third party.

Much of my experience mirrors the review of VoIP by Knight-Ridder’s Mike Langberg.

Langberg's view that AT&T will open the VoIP floodgates clearly reflects what I wrote when AT&T expanded their VoIP offering. Basically, as a brand leader, AT&T has to do that, or everyone from Dave Dorman on down is out of a job. Not only have they been technology leaders, they have been marketing leaders in the past but not for many years. Their last few leaders, Michael Armstrong come to mind, were basically the same. Expansionists, looking to broaden the business of AT&T into other sectors---do you remember them buying TCI cable? What AT&T did was go into areas they thought they could be bullish in, and ended up hurting their core business. Telephony. Dorman is clearly focusing on just that.

The entry of companies like Sprint and MCI in the 70s and 80s fueled price wars, and then many a new company came along thereafter. With VoIP, AT&T is clearly setting its sites on the market, not just in the USA, but possibly globally.

VoIP connections know no boundaries, and a brand with the global stature of AT&T is clearly going in that direction. If one looks at the type of press coverage Call Vantage is receiving, it is clear that they are seeking out, and securing the trial participation of media thought leaders.

Langberg, whose writings are syndicated by Knight-Ridder, is the type of writer who gets in front of more Ma and Pa America than most. While he's not Walt Mossberg, Langberg’s reporting, when syndicated, hits more people who can be VoIP consumers than the business savvy readers of the Wall Street Journal. That’s just like the daily broadcast on KenRadio.com which I co-host. That broadcast reaches more daily listeners than most tech writers in local USA markets.

VoIP in the USA is about two things. Marketing--giving the customer what they want and Quality of Services, which is what AT&T is setting out to do. Vonage in their defense is also seeking to reach that goal but the difference within their calling technology (SIP vs. MGCP today, a managed and one hop peering network for CallVantage, the open Internet for Vonage, etc) are the differentiators today.

A recent customer service experience with Vonage, done by a VoIP call to their call center resulted in the problem being fixed (someone else’s email address was in my profile for where voice mail was to be forwarded--and in their defense, I was still getting the messages, just the web database was fouled). Within two hours, a Vonage engineer, not a call center rep, was on the phone to me telling me the problem was fixed, and I also received a confirming e-mail. That’s customer service.

AT&T's CallVantage service has been flawless, save one thing. Their e-mail notification for conference calls has not worked 100 percent, in that other parties to calls have reported back that they never received the call notification. To date, my note to AT&T sent via their web support portal has not resulted in a similar type of experience that I had with Vonage’s support center, though their PR person has made note of my comment and responded within minutes to my advising him out of courtesy. He, an AT&T veteran of 20+ years, like Dorman, gets it right.

This gets around to understanding marketing and the media’s role.

Both Vonage and AT&T understand the care and feeding of the press, and respect bloggers and online media people the same way they respect traditional print and electronic reporters. Maybe more so. Our audiences meet the first criteria for a customer for both. The audience has to already be online.

Unfortunately, many VoIP companies don't get it. The list is led by Stanaphone, the company that put out a press release after Memorial Day which prompted a call by me to their PR agency. I loaded the nice and very professional representative up with questions and over a week went by. Nothing. I called her again. No return phone call. I emailed her again and got a note back saying the CEO had been at VON in Europe. So? This is VoIP. VON had broadband. Hotels have phones and the CEO of Stanaphone owns an ISP in Silicon Valley. What’s worse is no one else seemed to be around to answer the questions, leading one to believe that Stanaphone is a very small, under financed company.

If I could do a globally heard technology program from London and Paris using my VoIP phone last November using Vonage, if laptops have softphones, how hard would it be to call back to the USA. One more week went by and I received an e-mail from the CEO. He apologized for being @ VON, then proceeded to give me what read like a form letter response, without answering one question of the dozen or so that I posed. I replied two or three days ago (from my Danger Sidekick) while on the road suggesting he and his PR person get a conference call set up, and again....no reply.

Let me compare them to Skype. A question emailed to their London, England PR team was replied to in minutes with comments from their engineering team and questions about my experience using the Clarisys USB phone, which seemed less than compatible with Skype than a regular headset/mic combination. That’s why Skype is getting such wide spread publicity. They get it.

Add Broadvoice to the list of clueless marketers. They have, or claim to have, the early lead with WiSIP---WiFi enabled handset from Pulver Innovations that works as a SIP endpoint with PSTN termination. It has been over a month since my query to the CEO. To date he has not replied to questions, or provided a demo to determine how good their service is. Hype? Or just poor marketing and media skills.

VoiceGlo, a company whose motives I question, only is furthering that feeling with their absolutely clueless PR strategy. First they hired a big name PR firm. The person running the account has no clue about VoIP--as evidenced by the fact that when I talked to him he admitted as much saying he “was just getting up to speed” when I called. He promised though to "keep me clued in" on their efforts and appreciated my “reaching out to him.” I brought this to the attention of the PR person for VoiceGlo, who promised action. Nada. Zippo. Nothing.

To date, not one VoiceGlo press release has hit my inbox, and judging by their apparent sales strategy, using resellers and distributors to build their customer base, and working the analysts to gain respect they are seeking to influence Wall Street and the financial community, more than the media that can drive the customers their way. Their VoIP PBX solution *COULD* serve a large niche in the SOHO market, but without knowing the quality of their offering, or having technical questions answered, it becomes hard to provide fair and balanced coverage of their offerings.

So the world knows, analysts and the firms they work for are usually paid to write nice things about client companies, or if they have nothing nice to say, they follow mom’s advice, and say nothing. I don’t. Candidly, I like on paper what VoiceGlo is setting out to do. Michael Egan is a very smart, successful, if not a bit full of himself, ego driven, arts loving, modern era CEO. So, what, some people might say the same about me. However, Egan is very good at building up a business that the market can understand. He knows how to produce sales and turn a profit for a business that can eventually be sold off. The question is does VoiceGlo really have the product that it claims to have and the team to get that story out?

Next up is Peerio. They issued a press release back in May. To date their client software is not out, Supercomm is around the corner. In defense their newest PR person, I think this is PR person number three since they first came out of stealth mode (something I first broke on VoIPWatch), and has promised full cooperation after SuperComm…big whoop. Bloggers like me want to break stories, not be followers. We pave trails like pioneers, often going where others have yet to tred. Peerio has a very interesting model, from what I know from background provided by someone close to the company. It would be nice to really be able to tell the whole story, accurately.

The bottom line is blog based journalists break stories and provide critical insight to the real goings on inside an industry. We’re not analysts whose coverage is tempered by the client list. We’re not media supported by an ad sales team that insures a paycheck every week. Bloggers and online journalists provide useful, insightful, experienced usage to the readers and the PR folks who give us the same respect they give Walt Mossberg and others.

I’ll be the first to admit that both AT&T and Vonage have for periods of time provided the service and equipment for free. So has Webley, as have companies that send products and software to review. A responsive PR team that understands how to work with media influencers wins the battle of the mind and the wallets of the marketplace.

But as a blogger, like my friend Bob Cox, who authors The National Debate, the traditional media is recognizing us, and seeking out our views on subjects, not only lifting information from out blogs. The same for PaidContent.org and Om Malik's GigaOm in the new technology media and content space. They are not only breaking stories, they are each providing outstanding content about the spaces they cover from a truely journalist first, fair is fair, and facts may mess up their story, but they report accurately and provide well written commentary. In a word, they are today's Press.

Bloggers are becoming subject matter experts, and should the story I was interviewed for run soon, I’m sure the companies mentioned, both pro and con, will know that.. Not only with their service, but with how they care and feed all the press. Bloggers and webcasters included.

Off the soap box.