VoIPWatch

Thoughts on the Top 25 VoIP Bloggers List

I'm humbled once again to be considered one of the best. Words cannot express how I feel about being named number two behind pal Jeff Pulver when it comes to being recognized as an authority on the subject called VoIP. It was Jeff who first agreed to my suggestion that a bloggers panel at VON back in 2005 would be a great way to propel blogging as a mainstream news and analysis source of information for the VoIP industry.

What's more meaningful though is that as I look at the list I see many of the people I consider friends right there too. These are not people who just know each other. Many are comrades in arms.

For example, if it wasn't for Om Malik wanting to learn about which wines go with which Indian dish I would not have met the woman who is now my wife, Helene. Alec Saunders is both friend and client. Our similar passions for all things tech, wine and travel give us more to talk about when we see each other (which isn't often enough) I also never would have participated in a DEMO God award ceremony if he and Howard hadn't conceived iotum, and had the good fortune to brainstorm in my white board room that DEMO would be the defining event for iotum. Rich Tehrani's events have provided a springboard to moderate panels at in VoIP. Guys like Jim Courtney, Phil Wolff, Russell Shaw and others are regular dining companions at industry events, with and without my wife who has gotten to know them all as well.

Thank you to the judges. But most of all, thank you to the readers. You are why this is all possible.

P.S. No list is ever complete. I'd add Ted Wallingford, PhoneBoy who deserves credit for the listed CreativeWeblog VoIP blog and pal Aswath to the list immediately. All are far more technical than I can ever dream of being and provide the kind of counter balance we need to know not only what works, but why it works better.

Well Deserved Attention For My Pal Om

Congrats to pal Om Malik for being named number 12 on the Forbes Web Celebs list.

A Perspective on SIP

Dan Berninger posts his perspective about SIP on GigaOm...the same day that Fring announced FWD integration.

Skype Future By Skype Journal

Phil Wolff has casted an eye in the direction of a crystal ball and makes some 37 different predictions about Skype.

The one I'm most interested in is regards the new leader. With CES coming up, and the company whisperers saying that they were down to the last two candidates prior to Thanksgiving, and now they are down to one, a person of European background who is involved in mobile or telco in either Europe or the UK, I'd think the big Las Vegas consumer electronics gathering would be one of two ideal places to announce the hiring. The other being the next eBay earnings call. Unless of course they didn't get their person...

What To Do With The WebCam You Got For The Holiday

There may be a writers' strike in Hollywood, but that's not keeping the always funny SightSpeed Guy from showing off and telling the world what to do with the new webcam that arrived over the holidays.

Check out his latest Top Ten video!

VoIP Tops Best Way To Cut Costs Lists

eWeek has a story that talks about how unified communications and VoIP are money saving efforts for business.

That's good news for clients like Junction Networks and Thomas Howe from the get go and for just about any company going after parts of any corporation's budget.

The Pogies Are Announced

The New York Times' David Pogue released his list of the top 2007 techie products he likes.

One of them which I've been using is the T-Mobile Hotspot@Home service that lets me connect my Blackberry to a WiFi network and then make and receive calls for free over my T-Mobile account regardless of where I am. It has some quirks, mostly NAT/Firewall related when I'm traveling, but when I'm in a hotel and can use my own pocket size travel router, its as if I'm "home."

A second product that I was pleased to see was the Novatel USB-EVDO Memory stick. Novatel debuted that new smart offering at San Diego's GadgetFest which I co-hosted along with Ken Radio this past November for CommNexus.

Pogues recognition of that, shows once again that GadgetFest is an early indicator of what will be a hot product. The 2006 GadgetFest winner was GrandCentral with PhoneGnome winning in 2005.

We Need More Bandwidth

The editorial in today's Boston Globe is a rallying cry for the need for increased capacity in order to fuel growth of Next Generation Internet applications and services, including VoIP and Video.

It also means that many of the applications the mobile world wants to have that can make them more money will need it too. One of the false flags is that with CDMA there's more capacity in the air. Well there is, but what happens when all that traffic hits the network after reaching the cellular tower? Duh....it needs to go over the network. That's one reason why the AT&T's, Verizon's and T-Mobile's have all been expanding what they have in the ground nationwide and why Level3 remains such a long term winner.

As someone who appreciates fiber in my technology diet, I can clearly see the need for more fiber players and more fiber options in the near term.

Wine and Coffee

Tue 25/12/2007 21:54 25122007079

Is VoIP In The Air?

Rich posts about in flight WiFi and the potential banning of VoIP on the planes.

First I'm old enough to remember the GTE Airphone and actually used it a lot in the90's, especially when they had their $1000 a year all you could talk plan. Back then I was flying about every three weeks cross country and after doing the math, found out that I could talk cheaper from the plane after month four or so than I could on the ground. It ended my "need" constantly flying only on red eyes.

Now fast forward to the Internet in the sky era. As someone who received a few "phone calls" on overnight flights between the west coast and Germany on Lufthansa and the Boeing Conexxion service, and also made a few, it sure came in handy so I'm not seeing the rub so much as others.

Consider this as a counter. What happens when you want to sleep and you have two "chaty" Charlie's of "chaty" Cathy's sitting behind you the entire flight? Is there any difference? Have you ever tried to tell them to be quiet, and that you want to a) sleep b) write the next great novel when the two people who never met before decide to tell their life story to one another...?

So given that argument of facts as my old argumentation professor would say, I ask "why not just ban all talking on airplanes?" I mean what's the difference between a cell phone like call on a plane and a chat from those two someones next to you. Both are noise?

Maybe we should just ban all talking on airplanes.....?  NOT!