Page 1 2 Page 1 2| FRIDAY - SEPTEMBER 15, 2006 - ISSUE NO. 229 |
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| Wireless Messaging Newsletter | ||
| WIRELESS  MESSAGING | |
| EUROPEAN MOBILE MESSAGING ASSOCIATION |
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| EUROPEAN MOBILE MESSAGING ASSOCIATION |
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CUSTOM APPLICATIONS
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NEWS RELEASE September 12, 2006 CTIA-The Wireless Association® Elects 2007 Board of Directors WASHINGTON, D.C. - CTIA-The Wireless Association® President and CEO Steve Largent announced today that SunCom Wireless Holdings CEO, Michael Kalogris has been elected as the wireless industry trade group's new Chairman. Mr. Kalogris, who was serving as the organization's Vice Chairman last year, will assume the position of Chairman effective immediately. The CTIA Board of Directors formally elected their officers and new members for 2007 while gathered in Los Angeles for the CTIA WIRELESS I. T. & Entertainment® show. Mr. Kalogris succeeds Mr. Len Lauer, former COO of Sprint Nextel. "I want to congratulate Mike Kalogris on his well-deserved election to the Chairmanship," said Steve Largent, CTIA-The Wireless Association President and CEO. "Mike has distinguished himself as a leader in the highly competitive wireless industry by serving as the chief executive officer with various wireless companies for nearly 20 years. As a member of our Board of Directors since 1990, Mike will undoubtedly be a tremendous asset to the association and the industry as a whole in his new role as Chairman," said Largent. Largent also commented on Kalogris' predecessor, saying, "Len Lauer's leadership as the association chairman and dedication to serving the wireless community have been exemplary. He has consistently provided keen insight on a number of wireless-related issues and I appreciate the valuable contributions Len has made to the association's and industry's efforts to promote public policy and initiatives that benefit wireless consumers." Other CTIA officers elected at today's board meeting include; Verizon Wireless Executive Vice President and COO, Lowell McAdam as Vice Chairman, Lucent Mobility Solutions President, Cindy Christy as Treasurer, and T-Mobile USA President and CEO, Robert Dotson as Secretary. Each of them assumes their officer's positions on January 1, 2007. McAdam is rejoining the CTIA Board of Directors, having served on the board in his previous executive capacity with PCS Primeco. Christy and Dotson will hold officers' positions for the second consecutive year, although their new roles are reversed from the positions they currently hold. "It is my pleasure to welcome these industry leaders as officers of our association," said Largent. "Each of them brings a wealth of talent and experience to the table, and I'm looking forward to working with them as CTIA continues its mission of expanding the wireless frontier." CTIA also welcomed industry leaders Craig Eisler, Senior Vice President of AOL Mobile, and James Moak, General Manager of Wireless Operations for Mohave Cellular to the board for the first time. # # # CTIA is the international association for the wireless telecommunications industry, |
15.9.2006
Text Messaging Integration Made Easy
PageOne, the UK's foremost supplier of wireless messaging technology and services, announces the launch of its new online community website for software developers, Oventus.com. Named after PageOne's award winning, multi-platform messaging platform Oventus, the website has been created to act as a "one stop shop" for developers. It will provide them with a wealth of information, tools, examples and support for integrating messaging functionality into their own applications.
Oventus.com aims to facilitate an online information zone where developers looking to embed messaging solutions within an application, can interact and exchange information whilst having access to PageOne's extensive knowledge base and development tools. Key amongst these tools is a specially developed "SOAP" software tool that enables developers to rigorously test, and scrutinize coding prior to deployment. Developers have the added bonus of being able to use the website to contact PageOne's development support team for additional information.
Oventus is utilised by hundreds of organisations across the UK to supply high-capacity mobile messaging for their businesses. Network independent, Oventus enables seamless integration of messaging to all worldwide GSM networks, UK paging and email clients. Utilising connectivity API's such as SMTP, SNPP, SMPP and SOAP/XML protocols, Oventus can support a wide range of message input sources from dial-up, IP to sophisticated XML solutions for web-based and desktop messaging.
Clair Cawley, Marketing Manager for PageOne said.
— Today, technology can offer an extensive choice of communication methods. The challenge facing most organisations is how to create a smooth, glitch-free interaction between this myriad of hardware devices. With Oventus.com we have created a resource that developers can utilise to achieve exactly that. Email, mobile phones, pagers and PDAs can now all be connected with ease through Oventus. If you want direct, desktop text messaging included in a company wide application or include multi-directional communication within a web-based, field sales staff management tool, Oventus.com will provide developers with everything they need.
Source: SWBusiness.Fl
| WIRELESS MESSAGING NEWS |
ABC offers a million free show finales via iTunes
By Peter Cohen
Apple’s U.S. iTunes Store now features the Million Hit Lowdown, a special promotion from ABC that offers free season finales and recaps of three of its biggest hit shows — at least until they've been downloaded a million times.
“Fans or first-timers, now is the time to catch up on television’s biggest hits,” reads the info on the Million Hit Lowdown page. ABC is offering for free the first million downloads of Lost, Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy, three of its most popular dramas from the past television season.
What’s more, the company is offering unlimited downloads of special highlight shows helping viewers who may have missed episodes (or perhaps never watched) to get up to speed with what’s happening, in time for each series’ season premier this fall. The highlight shows feature commentary from show producers and editors of People magazine and Entertainment Weekly.
Source: PlayListMag
CTIA sees 70% increase in data-service revenues
Test & Measurement World, 9/14/2006 4:59:00 AM
CTIA—The Wireless Association has announced that data-service revenues for the first half of 2006 were $6.5 billion, representing a 70% increase over the first half of 2005. Wireless data revenues now total almost 11% of all wireless service revenues.
"Data is no longer on the horizon; it is here today," said CTIA—The Wireless Association president and CEO Steve Largent. "Data is now a reality for wireless carriers and consumers alike. With healthy increases in wireless revenues and usage, it is safe to say that we are expanding the wireless frontier."
The organization released its semiannual wireless-industry survey September 13 at CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment 2006 event in Los Angeles. The survey also found that wireless carriers reached record total service revenues of $60.5 billion for the first six months of 2006. As of June 2006, the industry survey recorded more than 219 million wireless users, which represents a year-over-year increase of 25 million subscribers. The industry's 12-month record for subscriber growth was reached in 2005, when 25.7 million new users came online.
Wireless carriers reported delivering more than 12.5 billion text messages in the month of June 2006, up 72% over the 7.3 billion messages for June 2005. The reported number of MMS messages delivered in the first half of 2006 was 1.1 billion, equal to the total number of MMS messages reported for all of 2005.
Other highlights of the survey include wireless customers using more than 850 billion minutes in the first half of 2006, up 27% over the first half of 2005, and a $10 billion increase in capital investment.
www.ctia.org.
Cingular Launches Podcast Service
The Mobilcast service lets consumers search and listen to thousands of podcasts by either streaming or downloading the content to a mobile phone.
By Laurie Sullivan
TechWeb
Sep 12, 2006 03:25 PM
Cingular Wireless has struck a deal with podcasting service Melodeo Inc. allowing consumers to upload and listen to podcasts on their mobile phone.
The Mobilcast service lets consumers search and listen to thousands of podcasts by either streaming or downloading the content. The announcement made Tuesday at the CTIA Wireless IT and Entertainment conference in Los Angeles.
Through an application download to the phone, consumers can get continuous updates from NPR, CNN, ESPN, as well as thousands of independent news and entertainment sources. The service is available on 15 handsets, with others coming on line soon.
A Web-to-mobile service comes with the Mobilcast subscription, allowing customers to sync podcast playlists between the Melodeo's Web site and the phone through the cellular service. Unlike Apple Computer Inc.'s iPod, synchronization occurs without connecting the phone to a PC or docking station.
The client application for the mobile phone combines a browser, catalog and search engine, said Melodeo CEO Jim Billmaier.
"By the beginning of next year, we'll have more than 50 percent of the subscriber base covered with all the carriers we continue to sign up in North America," Billmaier said. "We have a joint venture in China that will launch with the two largest carriers in the world before the end of this year."
Billmaier names the three largest carriers worldwide as China Mobile, China Unicom, and Vodafone Group.
Separately, Melodeo has plans to launch a "white-label Web site" that companies can customize to launch their own podcasting site.
Companies like Podcast Ready have developed software that lets consumers subscribe to podcasts in one click. MP3 manufacturer mobiBLU began shipping the application in its players in May.
All signs point to growth, particularly in the U.S. Research firm eMarketer estimates 10 million U.S. consumers will have downloaded at least one podcast by 2006, compared with 3 million people who will have downloaded on average one or more weekly. That number jumps to 50 million and 15 million, respectively, by 2010.
Maybe so, but Tim Bourquin, CEO at TNC New Media Inc., which hosts the Podcast and Portable Media Expo. doesn't attribute the growth to any one technology, but rather believes it's because people have become more aware. "New technology like podcasting catches on as more people begin to download and experiment," he said.
Podcast services through wireless carriers that make it easy to download content could push podcasting numbers higher. Several carriers already offer Melodeo's mobile phone podcast service for a monthly subscription fee. The company announced an agreement with Alltel Wireless in August and Canadian carrier Rogers Wireless in February. Billmaier said Melodeo plans to make public several deals with international wireless operators within the next 30 days that will extend Mobilcast's reach to more than 75 million customers across North America, Europe, Asia and Australia.
Source: Information Week
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• FIREHOUSES • SCHOOLS • PUBLIC FACILITIES • GOVERNMENT FACILITIES • EMERGENCY ROOMS • WHAT DO FEDERAL AND STATE GOVERNMENT AGENCIES, FORTUNE 500 COMPANIES, WISPS, HAVE IN COMMON? THEY ALL USE NIGHTHAWK. Nighthawk Systems Inc. manufactures low cost and reliable remote control products for fire house alerting, volunteer alerting, activation of warning signs and sirens, and a number of applications for public safety. The Company manufactures the EA1 and the FAS-8 which have been designed specifically for these applications. Both products are paging based and will work with any public or private paging network. They are available in all VHF, UHF, and 900 MHz paging frequencies. The products can serve as the primary notification system or an excellent, low-cost backup to existing systems.
The EA1 is the solution for remotely activating public warning signage. Examples include tornado sirens, flash flood warnings, fire danger, Amber Alert, icy roads, etc. The EA1 can also send text messages to scrolling signs. This can occur in conjunction with the activation of audible alarms and visual strobes. This is ideal for public notification in buildings, schools, hotels, factories, etc. The group call feature allows for any number of signs or flashing lights to be activated at the same time over a wide geographic area. In addition, the EA1 Emergency Alert is the perfect solution for low cost yet highly effective alerting of volunteer fire fighters in their home. When activated the EA1 will emit an audible alarm and activate the power outlet on the units faceplate. A common setup is to simply place the EA1 on a table and plug a lamp into the faceplate. When paged from dispatch or any touch tone phone the EA1 will awaken the fire fighter to a lit room. As an option the EA1 can be ordered with a serial cable, allowing for attachment of a serial printer. When paged the alphanumeric message will be printed out at the same time the alarm sounds and the outlet is activated. The EA1 is an ideal complement to alphanumeric belt pagers common to volunteers.
The FAS-8 is designed for activating one or more relays in a firehouse and if desired, printing the alphanumeric message to a serial printer. For this application the FAS-8 is set to activate upon receiving the proper paging cap code sent from 911 dispatch. Up to eight different devices can be activated all with individual time functions. The most common devices to turn on include the PA amplifier, audible wake up alarm, and house lights. The most common device turned off is the stove. The FAS-8 can accept up to 8 different cap codes and have separate relay and time functions per cap code. This allows for different alerting to be accomplished at the same physical location depending upon which cap code is sent. This can be very helpful when fire crews and medical crews are housed in the same building.
Put the innovative technology of Nighthawk to work for you. For more information on any of our products or services, please contact us. Nighthawk Systems, Inc. Phone: 877-764-4484 |
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Please click here to e-mail Ayrewave. | SATELLITE CONTROL FOR PAGING SYSTEMS $500.00 FLAT RATE TAPS—Texas Association of Paging Services is looking for partners on 152.480 MHz. Our association currently uses Echostar, formerly Spacecom, for distribution of our data and a large percentage of our members use the satellite to key their TXs. We have a CommOneSystems Gateway at the uplink in Chicago with a back-up running 24/7. Our paging coverage area on 152.480 MHz currently encompasses Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, Louisiana, and Kansas. The TAPS paging coverage is available to members of our Network on 152.480 MHz for $.005 a transmitter (per capcode per month), broken down by state or regions of states and members receive a credit towards their bill for each transmitter which they provide to our coverage. Members are able to use the satellite for their own use If you are on 152.480 MHz or just need a satellite for keying your own TXs on your frequency we have the solution for you. TAPS will provide the gateways in Chicago, with Internet backbone and bandwidth on our satellite channel for $ 500.00 (for your system) a month. Contact Ted Gaetjen @ 1-800-460-7243 or tedasap@asapchoice.com |
| WIRELESS MESSAGING NEWS |
GoDaddy.com Gets Customers onto the Video Podcasting Stage
HostReview.com
Thursday, September 7, 2006; 02:57 AM
GoDaddy.com® customers, who rely upon its Quick Podcast service to provide audio programs to their fans, now have the convenience and flexibility to host their videocasts online. MPEG-4, the global media standard, provides professional quality audio and video streams delivered over a range of bandwidths and accessible from broadband and mobile devices.
Go Daddy customers can realize the benefits of H.264 video compression technology when hosting their videocasts (vlogs, etc). After uploading the media file, the video appears in QuickTime® and can be played online, syndicated to iTunes®, and downloaded to PCs and portable media players. By uploading data in the MPEG-4 format, less storage space is needed than is typically required for a similar quality file. This means that by using smaller files requiring less bandwidth, a larger catalogue of podcasts/programs can be made available by Go Daddy customers to their subscribers. With Quick Podcast, Go Daddy customers can host and publish video and audio podcasts on an easy-to-use platform starting at $4.99 per month.
Podcasting is alluring because of its ability to reach niche audiences by providing content not always available through traditional media and because it offers on-demand access and portability. According to a recent Nielson/NetRatings report, podcasting is experiencing explosive growth. Nearly 7 percent of the U.S. online population (or 9.2 million Web users) have recently downloaded an audio or video podcast, outpacing those who publish blogs (4.8 percent) or date online (3.9 percent).
“Getting our customers onto the podcasting stage easily and with the best available technology is our goal,” said Bob Parsons, CEO and founder of The Go Daddy Group, Inc. “I've been podcasting for more than a year and it has enabled us to reach a wider audience in an entertaining and exciting format.”
For more information about GoDaddy.com’s Quick Podcast, visit:
http://www.godaddy.com/gdshop/pod/landing.asp Listen to Bob Parsons’ Life Online™ radio show live every Wednesday at (www.lifeonline.com)
About The Go Daddy Group, Inc.
Go Daddy® is a leading provider of services that enable individuals and businesses to establish, maintain and evolve an online presence. Go Daddy provides a variety of domain name registration and Web site hosting services, as well as a broad array of on-demand services. The Go Daddy Group is the world's No. 1 domain name registrar and has more than 15 million domain names under management. Go Daddy is also North America's largest shared Web site hosting provider. During the final six months of 2005, The Go Daddy Group registered approximately one-third of all domain names registered in the top five generic top-level domains, or gTLDs, including .com, .net, .org, .biz and .info.
Source: HostReview
Leo Laporte's Podcast Success Snares Major Advertisers
'TWiT' Ad Network Finds Benefits for Marketers and Listeners
By Abbey Klaassen
Published: September 12, 2006
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Leo Laporte didn't expect to become one of the largest independent podcasters when he began recording his conversations with former Tech TV colleagues and friends John C. Dvorak, Patrick Norton and Kevin Rose. But it happened and this week he launched the This Week in Tech (or TWiT, as his fans know it) podcast advertising network, in conjunction with podcast advertising company Podtrac.
 Tech news guru Leo Laporte is launching a podcast advertising network. |
Podtrac measures TWiT's monthly reach at 500,000 and marks TWiT listeners among the highest spenders online and on software — which is why the network has attracted Dell, T-Mobile and Visa. Mr. Laporte's podcast mini-empire could rake in as much as $2 million dollars in a year, but he told Ad Age Digital he's more concerned about how to not ruin the medium with advertising.
Ad Age Digital: You are up to 10 podcasts now — how did you get to the point?
Mr. Laporte: Well we've got two more coming — I won't settle until I'm doing a dozen [laughs]. The business is being invented as we speak. There's no model, you can't look to someone else and say how did they do it? It's not radio, not a website, but something unique. We've done it organically and as the audience wanted it. ... [For the TWiT crew] the podcasts are the after-hours conversation when you get together with others in the same field and swap stories collegially -- that's how we really learn. ... So a lot of it was done just for us and I realized a lot of people would probably want to feel like they were in on conversation too. ... It really wasn't meant to build a network and there was no plan to put ads on it.
Ad Age Digital: But that has changed.
Mr. Laporte: Originally we just asked for submissions, which covered equipment, website, office rental. But they grew and grew and grew and the audience grew and grew and grew. At some point the light went on and it was like building an audio version of TechTV, it was more like a network. I said, "Maybe this needs to be more than a hobby but maybe a business for those people who are doing it." So the goal has been to start monetizing it so we could start paying contributors. And that's where advertising really makes the difference.
Ad Age Digital: So now you ask people to donate — like a paid subscription — and you take advertising. Kind of like a magazine model?
Mr. Laporte: We're very much like a magazine model, where the paper and shipping would be paid for by subscriptions and then the ads pay the staff and help you make a profit. Unlike broadcasting every additional person costs us money [because of added bandwidth costs], which is also very much like a magazine. You do want growth but you have to think about what it's going to cost you. ... Actually, we're more like public radio where your listeners are your supporters but you have corporate donors who donate things like bandwidth and also advertisers or sponsors.
Ad Age Digital: Corporate donors?
Mr. Laporte: We've been lucky to find bandwidth donors in AOL and Cachefly. AOL gives us about a terra byte a day. ... I'll publish a podcast and none of the clients are polite. It's like you have 200,000 people standing outside your door and you throw the podcast out and they all jump on it at the same time -- the bandwidth spikes are huge. So when you throw it out at midnight on Monday, they all pounce. Podcasters really have a lot of challenges nobody else has had to deal with. It's not how many bits and bytes you use but how many in one minute. A video podcast that was really big took the service offline for 24 hours.
Ad Age Digital: How has your audience received the advertising?
Mr. Laporte: There's some pushback from audience, which includes a lot of tech enthusiasts. A certain percent of them think we should be doing it for free. But we're not the free software movement, we're trying to create a product. ... I'm an old radio guy and like the old-fashioned radio model, with the host doing the ad live in the program, like Paul Harvey, Charles Osgood ... it's folksy, less intrusive, gives advertisers great benefit because it's endorsement, it's us saying we like Dell. And it doesn't feel like an ad. It carries more weight. Americans kind of get it because they've heard Paul Harvey but in the U.K. they don't do this. The U.K. listeners are going, wow, we've never heard this before. When they do an ad they do all interstitials. ... But two commercials is as much as we'll ever run. I don't ever want to have more than that — one, to make audience happy and two, to give the advertisers more value.
Ad Age Digital: It sounds like you're very concerned about preserving podcasting for both listeners and advertisers. Could one greedy podcaster that takes tons of ads ruin the medium for everyone?
Mr. Laporte: People look at what we're doing at TWiT to see what makes sense and I'm aware of that responsibility. I'm delivering the keynote at Podcast Expo and I'm going to address it. Podcasters are pretty independent-minded ... but all podcasters agree that podcasting has more value than radio or almost everything and we deserve a high cost per thousands [of listeners] and are going to create an environment that's worth it for advertisers. We don't want to jam it for advertisers. And the audience will let you know — they're not passive. It's more of a conversation than a monologue. ... We need to hold the line and really deliver quality advertising. It's going to be hard at first, [podcasters will have to be] turning down advertisers, running fewer ads than you'd like, not take in as much money as you'd like. But if we can focus on delivering something of value we can make both advertisers and listeners happy. It's a great opportunity and you don't get a new medium very often.
Ad Age Digital: Do you think podcasts from mainstream media companies will exercise enough restraint in the advertising area or could they screw it up for everyone?
Mr. Laporte: I hope they screw it up. I see them as using podcasts to drive to their bread and butter. We're narrowcasters and they're broadcasters and there's a big difference. "Ask a Ninja" wants to be "Seinfeld" but people like me and most I know are narrowcasters. We want to super-serve an audience and develop a relationship. [Broadcasters] see themselves as delivering a lot of people to advertisers and inefficiently. But those days are drying up. There will always be the Tides and Coca-Colas who can afford that but most companies in this modern world need to be efficient and they can be by using these new technologies.
Source: AdvertisingAge
Skype slips into business
By Robert Mitchell, Computerworld Today
September 11, 2006 12:49 pm ET
Two years ago, Mark Ehr and a few co-workers began using Skype to communicate between Proxima Technology’s Denver headquarters and its offices in Sydney, Australia, and Windsor, England. “I’d spent hours talking to Sydney,” says Ehr, director of product marketing at the 70-person software company. Luxembourg-based Skype’s peer-to-peer voice-over-IP software routes calls over the public Internet, offers good voice quality and supports conference calls — and it’s free, he says.
Soon, top executives began using Skype for internal calls. “That set the tone for the rest of the company,” Ehr says, and today Skype is the primary means of making intra-company calls at Proxima. Skype has also allowed Proxima to put off a planned migration to an internal VOIP telephony system.
Driven by convenience and potential cost savings, Skype and other consumer-focused public peer-to-peer calling networks have been quietly gaining ground in businesses, to the delight of some and the chagrin of others. While such public calling networks can cut costs, administrators must also sort through the management, compliance and security implications.
That needs to happen fast. As with public instant messaging services, peer-to-peer VOIP has taken root with consumers, who are increasingly using the programs at work. “Services like Skype are indeed coming into enterprises, brought in by users much in the same way IM services were brought in years ago,” says Irwin Lazar, an analyst at Burton Group. Currently, some 30 percent of Skype clients use the service for business calls, says Will Stofega, an analyst at IDC.
Skype and programs such as Microsoft Live Messenger and Yahoo Messenger With Voice combine instant messaging and file-transfer capabilities with voice- and videoconferencing capabilities, integrating those into a single, proprietary soft client on the desktop. Contact lists are built by sharing user IDs in the same fashion as instant messaging “buddy lists”. Most programs can only call users that have the same client, although a few, such as Gizmo, are more open.
Users particularly like the ability to see whether a person is online before initiating a call, says Lazar. “Voice mail is cumbersome and annoying. It’s a lot nicer if you can avoid voice mail by sharing presence information,” he says.
Skype, which claims more than 100 million registered users, established an early lead in public VOIP calling. It has traditionally offered the best voice quality, although it faces increasing competition. Skype was also the first to offer value-added services to connect VOIP callers to the public switched telephone network (SkypeOut) and to allow users to buy a local telephone number that PSTN users can call to reach a Skype soft phone (SkypeIn). “Skype is successful because it just works. … It is easy to use and seamlessly traverses network address translation [devices] and firewalls,” says Jeff Pulver, chairman and founder of Pulvermedia, which offers the competing Free World Dialup.
The advantages of peer-to-peer VOIP go beyond just cost savings, says Stofega. “From a consumer perspective, it’s a price game, but from a business perspective, it’s evolved into an application, a tool that can help business processes.”
For example, Peter Dout, IT specialist at US Robotics Corp, says employees use Skype to communicate from home with overseas offices in different time zones. “You don’t have to be in the office to take that Skype call,” he says. The company, which also sells Skype-compatible headsets, has formally embraced peer-to-peer calling and even includes a Skype client in its basic desktop system image.
But US Robotics’ use goes beyond interoffice calling. Customers can click on a button on its Web site and connect to its call center via Skype. Dout created a single Skype ID for support calls and uses SkypeOut to forward incoming calls from that ID to a regular PSTN number in the call center. Routing calls to the call center through the PSTN allows Skype calls to be logged and recorded just like any other incoming call. “The infrastructure I have set up for this call center all gets used. It’s the same as a regular land-line call,” says Dout. The configuration also enables US Robotics to manage just one Skype ID for all incoming Skype calls.
For Mary Galbavy, director of customer operations at US Robotics, the key benefit has been cost savings. In the US, incoming calls through SkypeOut cost US$0.017 per minute versus $0.05 via the 800-number support line. The big savings, however, are realized in its European call centers. In Italy, for example, incoming calls over the PSTN cost $0.46 per minute versus $.023 with SkypeOut. Since users also pay a charge when calling in, they have an incentive to use Skype, and 26 percent of all callers in Italy do so. “We cut our telephone costs by a minimum of 20 percent,” says Galbavy. Worldwide, “at least 5 percent” of US Robotics’ customers are using Skype, and customer use has been growing at an annual rate of 175 percent, she says.
Proxima’s employees also use peer-to-peer calling to avoid toll charges when traveling. Users make calls via their laptops rather than incurring long- distance or mobile roaming charges, especially during trips abroad, says Ehr.
Proxima’s CEO recently purchased a dual-mode PDA phone so he could use Skype’s Pocket PC client over Wi-Fi — and uncovered a potential problem with peer-to-peer calling. The PDA lacks the power required to make Skype calls. “If you are the originator [of a call], your machine is doing all of the processing,” Ehr says, and conference calls increase the workload even more.
Skype and similar programs also lack centralized management capabilities, such as the ability to review and retain call detail records, and they may represent security risks, says Lazar. “For companies subject to Sarbanes-Oxley or HIPAA, that has been the showstopper,” he says. For other organizations, however, the choice is less clear.
Marvin Wheeler, chief operations officer at Terremark Worldwide, a collocation services provider in Miami, says he sees remote users increasingly calling in over services such as Google Talk or Skype. “For spot use, it’s great,” he says.
Peer-to-peer voice services are still consumer- focused and offer few features to support business needs. Most lack a well-designed, central directory, so each user must maintain his own list of user IDs. Skype users must set up a prepaid account to cover per-minute SkypeOut charges or monthly fees for a SkypeIn number. Skype does allow administrators to set up a common pool that specified employee accounts can draw against, but invoicing and detailed call billing aren't available, and individual user IDs must be configured and administered individually. “I need an account. I want to be invoiced,” Ehr says.
Wheeler is wary about the security implications of peer-to-peer calling. “For consumers, [the networks] are great. On a business level, you have to watch them. There’s also a business risk involved,” he says.
With Skype, for example, calls are encrypted, but the encryption scheme has not been subject to open, public review. Skype, which uses multiple ports to get through firewalls, is particularly difficult to block. It also offers an application programming interface (API) that developers can use to create presence-aware applications that can traverse the Skype network. Since Skype supports file transfers, it’s possible that “Skypecasts” could transfer copyrighted content into or out of the enterprise, says Lazar.
However, security concerns may be overblown. “If the flaws were easy to exploit, someone would have figured out how to do it by now,” Lazar says.
Michael Jackson, director of operations at Skype, says the latest client disallows access to the API by default and allows the file transfer feature to be disabled.
Eventually, integrated clients within businesses will become common, says Lazar. For example, products like Avaya’s Converged Communication Server and Microsoft’s Office Communications Server 2007, slated for release next year, offer a similar experience to services like Skype for internal calling. However, such products typically won’t work with public peer-to-peer systems such as Skype.
With the gradual adoption of a unified client for internal use, users will benefit from using presence awareness with VOIP calling. As was the case with IM systems, however, administrators could face the prospect of having two integrated communications clients on user desktops — a private one for internal use and a public one for free, peer-to-peer calling outside of the company. Eventually, clients for internal use may offer some degree of federation with public peering services such as Skype, Lazar predicts. But in the interim, peer-to-peer VOIP services are likely to continue gaining ground, particularly in organizations that haven’t yet moved to IP telephony and in small and midsize businesses where the auditing and controls are less strict.
The benefits are just too compelling for users to ignore, says Stofega. “It’s a cheap, simple application that gets the job done.”
Source: MacWorld
Posted on Tue, Sep. 12, 2006
RICHARD D. CARSELLO, 76
Helped develop first pager
BY SHANNON PEASE
spease@MiamiHerald.com
Richard D. Carsello, a longtime electrical engineer with Motorola, died Thursday of apparent heart complications, according to his son, John Carsello. The Plantation resident was 76.
Carsello joined the Chicago office of Motorola as a development engineer in 1957 and most recently worked at the Plantation location until his 2000 retirement. Carsello held several management positions and retired as vice president and director of advanced technology and planning. ''He helped develop the first pager in the United States in the 1960s. He was on the team that developed it,'' said his son, adding that Carsello was involved in developing two-way radios as well. “It was before we had cellphones and all that stuff.”
Friend and former colleague Joseph Cramer said Carsello was a professional who was highly respected, and very inquisitive. “He progressed from designer to manager of designers, to manager of the business responsible for all of those products he helped create,” Cramer said from his Illinois home. “A lot of creative work was done. Dick was at the forefront of that.”
In his spare time, Carsello enjoyed staying active, his son said.
Until about five years ago, Carsello was an avid runner. At 52 years old, he achieved his goal of finishing a marathon in under four hours. He was frequently seen jogging through his Plantation neighborhood, his son said. “He was still physically fit,” his son said. “For 76, he was very active.”
When Carsello collapsed Thursday, he was at the workout center at Motorola, his son said.
Carsello was born Aug. 5, 1930, in Chicago. He graduated from Holy Trinity High School there, and received a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Fournier Institute of Technology in Chicago in 1952. Carsello served in the U.S. Navy from 1953 until his honorable discharge in 1956. Carsello, a father of nine, later went back to school while his children were growing up and earned a master's degree in electrical engineering from Northwestern University, his son said.
Carsello was a singer with the Sunshine Chordsmen, The Sunshiners, and four separate barbershop quartets.
In addition to his son John, of Plantation, Carsello is survived by his wife of 52 years, Theresa Carsello of Plantation; daughters Kathy Harlow of Tampa, Mary Goldman of Tampa, Rosanne Regan of Hollywood; sons Gerry Carsello and Jim Carsello, both of Weston, Dan Carsello and Stephen Carsello, both of Plantation; sisters Delores Vanoni and Rosemarie Maher, both of Chicago; and fifteen grandchildren. He was predeceased by a son, Rich Carsello.
A visitation will be from 6 to 9 p.m. today at T.M. Ralph Plantation Funeral Home. A Mass will be at 10 a.m. Wednesday at St. Gregory Catholic Church in Plantation. Instead of flowers, the family suggests that donations be made to St. Jude's Children Hospital or another charity of choice.
Source: Miami Herald
| LETTERS TO THE EDITOR |
Looking For New Position
From:
George Wallace
Subject: Recruiters Needed
Date: September 14, 2006 12:53:53 PM CDT
To: brad@braddye.com
Brad,
Do you know any recruiters? My most recent telecom experience has been in the CLEC market: sales and sales management. (2000-present) My background in paging (again-sales and sales management) was with Dial Page/ MobileMedia/ MobileComm which rolled up into Arch (94-00).
I live in South Carolina but can relocate.
Thank you,
George Wallace
PS: I really enjoy reading the newsletter.
About disruptive products and services: Clayton Christiansen (Harvard Business School prof) has several books on the topic.
Dick Carsello Passing
From: Jim Page
Date: September 10, 2006 2:32:35 PM CDT
To: brad@braddye.com
Subject: Fwd: Dick Carsello Arrangements
Brad,
Dick was one of the early Paging scientists and later General Manager of the Division. A good manager, ethically-centered, and significant contributor behind the scenes. Good people seem harder and harder to find and Dick Carsello was one.
Regards,
Jim Page
From: BALDY BAER
Date: September 9, 2006 12:17:11 AM CDT
Subject: Dick Carsello Arrangements
Dick Carsello, passed away peacefully on Thursday, September 7th. Dick was a Motorola employee for 43 years during the years of 1957 - 2000.
Looking For Joe Vinson
From: RChomat@graylink.com
Subject: from the newsletter
Date: September 8, 2006 1:52:01 PM CDT
To: brad@braddye.com
Reply-To: RChomat@graylink.com
Brad,
Do you know Joe Vinson? He was with Morris Wireless. I've lost track of him & I'm trying to find him.
Bob Chomat, Jr.
GrayLink Wireless
850-841-7100 Ext. 220
| UNTIL NEXT WEEK |
Well, that's all for this week folks. Please stay in touch.
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