Working Anywhere

Arrived OK? Not Yet Landed In the USA

A very imaginative service has been developed called ArrivedOK and is in beta in many parts of the world, except the USA.

As a global nomad this kind of service is ideal for me, especially with my family and colleagues. I regularly text the word "landed" when I touch down using either SMS or the built in Blackberry Messenger to those on my Messenger Buddy List internally.

The service, which comes from a Texas company is awaiting USA carrier approval for a short code certificate, but when they get that, I imagine the service will be very useful to the frequent flier types who have to be working anywhere at any time. From my perspective, ArrivedOk will cut down on a task that for some can be time consuming or just challenging. They smartly have also included email as a notification mechanism.

Telefonica Gives Unemployed Subscribers a Break

Here's one for the USA carriers to consider. Over in Spain, mobile operator Telefonica is providing the unemployed a break on their mobile phone bills.

This is a great way to keep people on the network, versus losing them. It also helps keep their revenue constant, the carrier doesn't lose a telephone number, or the customer, plus the customer, who is likely job hunting, doesn't have a break in their ability to be reached.

I have to wonder which USA carrier will mirror this idea with unemployment reaching high levels these days due to the economy. In theory, AT&T should jump at this, but I suspect a more nimble player like Cricket or Metro PCS will be the first to make a similar offer.

EasyMeet Can't Come Soon Enough

It may only be in prototype stage, but the idea of Nokia's EasyMeet is something that is perfect for the wireless mobile worker of the future.

Wireless Moves has the details, to the concept that sounds much like Pronto from iotum, a proof of concept play that Alec Saunders introduced at DEMO a few years back that led to iotum winning a DEMO God Award.

If you watch the Easymeet Demo video, you'll see lot of similarity between the EasyMeet concept and iotum's Calliflower service which is already available today.

You can also try the beta version of easymeet online as well. The big difference is Easymeet is combining the Nokia devices and services platform, while also making the invitation media rich, while Calliflower is making the experience richer during and after the call.

T-Mobile 3G USB Stick-First Impressions

My first thoughts about T-Mobile's 3G card for USA are ... this.

1) No Mac support yet. But it is coming they promise.

2) Coverage area-very spotty so far, at least in San Diego County

3) Easy to install software for PCs. Installed quickly and fired up without issue on my Asus 1000HE Netbook. The software comes pre-loaded on the USB sitck.

Small, light. Made by Huawai, so the software for Macs won't be hard to write, as already 3 in the UK has that up and being offered.

More to come..

My New Verizon Mobile Broadband Modem is Business Grade

It's been two years or so and my love affair with the AT&T 3G network is waning. Until the 7 billion dollar network upgrade happens, those of us on the west coast California market will have to make due with the hope and prayer that that the iPhone carry crowd doesn't always bog down our uploads when we're conducting business on our AT&T powered Netbooks that one can buy at Radio Shack for $99.00 plus a data plan commitment.

When I'm in markets outside of the congestion packed LA, San Diego and San Francisco-San Jose regions the speeds are usually where they are supposed to be, like 1.5 megs down and roughly 500-700k up in Tulsa, Oklahoma when sitting at the gate for my Southwest flight to take off. But the inconsistent nature of the congestion and the two year renewal and opportunity to buy a new Aircard from Verizon for two of my accounts came around so we grabbed a couple of the newest offerings in CDMA 3G. I'm not sorry.

This week I ran a series of tests with the new card. The one that was the most impressive was a 30 minute packet loss free video call over Skype with a colleague on the Comcast network in San Francisco and another one the next day with webcasting colleague on KenRadio, Ken Rutkowski. On the Mac Book Pro and Mac Book Air the video was sharp and crisp. No wavering. The audio was pristine. Clear and without dropouts.

On my Netbooks, the audio experience was perfect, but the video was choppy.

Bottom line is given how much I travel, the Verizon card is now an essential part of my road warrior kit. Sure I'll still have AT&T and Sprint gear handy (I use the Sprint Card with a CradlePoint Router to share connections) but what I'm seeing from Verizon Wireless right now tells me their wireless broadband network is ready for business.

New Apple Wireless Gear Is Very Very VoIP Friendly

I've been using the newest versions of the Apple Time Capsule and Airport Extreme Wireless network devices for about a week now, and all I can say is WOW.

The experience once I cured a slight misconfiguration issue with my ISP (seems if you install as DHCP and connect to the Cox network the MAC address is registered) and that makes it impossible to switch to static without the help of support. Once that was solved the network showed blazing fast speeds. How fast? This fast.

34 megs down/5 megs plus up. On DOCSIS 2.0. I can hardly wait for 3.0.

This is an example of a network in my house that was rebuilt to be business grade. We had a network installed put in all new CAT 5 and CAT 6 as well as new electrical outlets (all grounded.) For the cable that brings the Cox Service to the house the tech from the cable company took time and drove the impedance loss to zero, matching and mixing things until that came along. Most of all, with the new Apple Wireless gear I have 802.11 (A/N) running on my Mac while I can create a second network for guests on the B/5 network.

Those speeds aren't pokey either, running between 5 megs and 12 megs depending on the chip set in a PC or Mac. My Asus 1000HE scores 12 megs regularly.

The hard wire network was also tuned up by my friends Chris McKewon and Steven Fairchild and their team at XCeptional Networks. These are the guys whose crews are masters at hotel broadband, like the Hotel 1000 in Seattle and the Intercontinental in Boston. We're talking EXPERTS in networking and deployment, both wired and wireless, plus VOIP.

When you think of a Home Office set up, you have to go pro. Amateur hour (i.e buying a consumer grade wireless access point) may be good for simple surfing, but when you spend hours working from home, spend the money so earning more isn't a chore. I may have gone to the Extreme edge with what's in mine, but the stats don't lie. Build it right, with proper cabling and equipment and your network can be rock solid and fast too.

New Apple Wireless Gear Is Very Very VoIP Friendly

I've been using the newest versions of the Apple Time Capsule and Airport Extreme Wireless network devices for about a week now, and all I can say is WOW.

The experience once I cured a slight misconfiguration issue with my ISP (seems if you install as DHCP and connect to the Cox network the MAC address is registered) and that makes it impossible to switch to static without the help of support. Once that was solved the network showed blazing fast speeds. How fast? This fast.

34 megs down/5 megs plus up. On DOCSIS 2.0. I can hardly wait for 3.0.

This is an example of a network in my house that was rebuilt to be business grade. We had a network installed put in all new CAT 5 and CAT 6 as well as new electrical outlets (all grounded.) For the cable that brings the Cox Service to the house the tech from the cable company took time and drove the impedance loss to zero, matching and mixing things until that came along. Most of all, with the new Apple Wireless gear I have 802.11 (A/N) running on my Mac while I can create a second network for guests on the B/5 network.

The hard wire network was also tuned up by my friends Chris McKewon and Steven Fairchild and their team at XCeptional Networks. These are the guys whose crews are masters at hotel broadband, like the Hotel 1000 in Seattle and the Intercontinental in Boston. We're talking EXPERTS in networking and deployment, both wired and wireless, plus VOIP.

Those speeds aren't pokey either, running between 5 megs and 12 megs depending on the chip set in a PC or Mac. My Asus 1000HE scores 12 megs regularly.

When you think of a Home Office set up, you have to go pro. Amateur hour (i.e buying a consumer grade wireless access point) may be good for simple surfing, but when you spend hours working from home, spend the money so earning more isn't a chore. I may have gone to the Extreme edge with what's in mine, but the stats don't lie. Build it right, with proper cabling and equipment and your network can be rock solid and fast too.

Pocket Meeting

ReadWriteWeb has the goods on a new, lightweight, screen sharing web presentation platform called PocketMeeting that looks very reasonable and sounds very good.

While the concept seems very logical, the question of business survivability has to be considered vs. WebEx. The dot.com industry is littered with web conferencing companies that are no longer around. What's amazing is none of the surviving companies ever go out to acquire the user base, which makes me wonder if any of the users are ever paying for the services. Instead I'd look more closely at the company whose technology is behind the service, GeniusRoom. At the heart they seem to have a more robust offering, providing all services in one place, but at a higher price point.

Bottom line. If you're using a free service, you end up getting what you pay for in the end. NOTHING.

Hip Work Spot Opens in London-No More Need For Starbucks

Cameron Sinclair pens a piece about a new hipster style work spot called the "Hub Pavilion" that has opened in London this week, over on the Huffington Post.

I think we are seeing the rise of the temporary office, networking "hub" and candidly think Starbucks really missed it.

For many a year I referred to Starbucks as Conference Room "S" to many. You could head over to one, and then organize a meeting. They had chairs, tables you could rearrange, couches, work desks, all that you wanted, and of course, amazing broadband from T-Mobile.

Then somewhere along the way, as their success overcame them, they lost their way. First they turned up the music. Then they turned down the temperature. Next came less and less tables. And then the final blow. Bye Bye T-Mobile and the amazing bandwidth. Hello AT&T and usually a DSL line. A slow DSL line.

These new Hub Spots though are the wave of the future in my book. Already Regus/HQ has opened a similar spot, dubbed the Business Lounge in Cupertino, CA not far from Apple's HQ. While they haven't added all the glitz and "social" components of Hub and Hub Culture, what they have both done is given the road warrior, and the "no need for an office" type of worker, a series of quiet, well decked out and useful locations to get down to work in environments that are serene and very functional.

Plus, they serve better coffee than Starbucks.

Worlds Fastest & Cheapest Broadband--In Japan

$20.00 a month for how much speed? Amazing. And they are using the same technology as the cable companies in the USA...Now put that into your smoke and pipe it Comcast, Cox, Cablevision, Charter, Time Warner, Cable Labs and Mr. President.

This is based on the new Docsis 3.0 standard from CableLabs, and if it's good enough to be "Made in Japan" we need to import that kind of thinking here in the Good Ol' US of A, dag gummit.

I mean if you wanted a broadband stimulus package to take roots, the best way to do that is to bring the price down, get more people hooked-up and connected.