When I received this Twitter message earlier this afternoon:

I clicked on the embedded URL and immediately was listening in on a conversation involving not only Stuart Henshall but also David Beckemeyer of Televolution (producer of PhoneGnome - now known as the PhweetGeek), I found I was in for a most interesting conversation experience. Within minutes we had a multi-party call involving as many as eight participants from India, Italy, Ireland (actually, Pat was calling in while on vacation in Spain) as well as others in the U.S. They had all joined "spontaneously" from a Twitter message (in my case initially seen via Twitter4Skype) as Stuart and David launched an Alpha version of Phweet this afternoon.

First thoughts and comments:

• The immediacy - send the URL via Twitter and any of your Twitter Followers can join with three clicks - the URL, the TringMe VoIP Flash Player widget and the "Allow" button within the Flash Player. At that point the call host needs to "accept" your request to join and you're into the conversation.
• You monitor the call participants and participate in a chat session via a web page with a URL dedicated to the specific call (www.phweet.com/[four character call code]). When the host ends the session, the URL dies also; however, tweets are the only traces left of the call.

• It's a mashup of Twitter, TringMe, and SIP-based services all hosted on a Televolution server.
• While, if you just send out a general Tweet all your Followers can join; you can Direct Message an individual, or individuals, if you want a totally private call.
• You can join from a browser or a SIP ID; for instance Pat Phelan (of MaxRoam fame) called in from a Nokia N95 via his Truphone SIP ID (Truphone number@truphone.com) but you can also join in from Gizmo 5 and other SIP-based services.
• It's Alpha: TringMe would periodically drop the call connection but a web page refresh would bring back the Widget button and you could instantly be in the conversation again.
• It's Alpha: when I attempted to host my own call with Stuart as the invitee, we could "see" each other on the related web page but the audio connection did not work.
• Joining a conversation actually involves a call out from the Televolution server; as a result they are only working with connections that do not involve termination charges. Eventually they would like to have a way to join from, say, a mobile phone while letting another party worry about the back office transactions.
• Call quality was quite good; David needs to up his mic volume but other parties were very clear. On the other hand there is no echo cancellation capability, so headsets are a requirement unless you have echo cancellation hardware embedded into your mic.
• This is totally an Internet based service: effectively your Twitter followers are the directory; there is no other form of intermediation, such as a softphone client, involved in setting up, and participating in, the call. It does require you have the Adobe Flash Player installed.
• It's Alpha: Stuart and David are still going through the discipline of defining a basic feature set.

Stuart and David are inviting Twitter members to give it a try; they want user feedback before even calling it Beta, to ensure it at least has all the basics of a service that provides reliable connections, total host control (for instance, they need to add the ability for a host to remove a participant) and meets basic call support needs. Overall it looks to be a promising concept and a unique "click-to-call" service that supports ad hoc social networking.

Other posts:

• Stuart Henshall: Why Phweet?
• Stuart Henshall: Who created the Phweetman?
• Pat Phelan: Phweet.com Talking on Twitter
• Phil Wolff: Phweet public alpha - from tweet to talk in one click
• TechCrunch: Call your Twitter pals with Phweet
• All public Phweet sessions

Tags: Phweet, Stuart Henshall, David Beckemeyer, Twitter, Televolution, TringMe, Pat Phelan, Truphone, Nokia N95

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 04:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

Mode shifting from twitter (great for metatalk: "can we phweet in 5 minutes?") to live, multi-party, p2p, in-browser, flash-only party lines.

"A Phweet is a shortURL that makes conversations and conference calls possible between Twitter friends and across other social networks. Let your friends know you are talking. Invite them to join in. No numbers, no new profiles. Simple, just start Phweet talking!" - the Phweet blog

Notes:

• A pilot project by Stuart Henshall (co-founder of Skype Journal) and David Beckemeyer (ceo of TelEvolution, former cto of Earthlink).
• Send feedback @phweet.
• Turn off flash blockers like AdblockPlus for Firefox .
• This search page lists all public phweets on twitter. 

Ah, the phweeting pwomise of tawoo wuv.

More from Jim Courtney.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 02:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Over the past few months there have been a few Skype Journal posts about iSkoot and how they provide mobile device access to Skype's services. Of course, iSkoot also provides the software behind the Skypephone on the 3 network in nine countries. Recently iSkoot has been getting some accolades from third parties:

Nokia named iSkoot for Skype as a featured Application of the Week earlier this month on both the Nokia site and the S60 site.

iSkoot loads your Skype contact list right onto your S60 device display screen, and with just a quick click of a button, you can call your contacts. With Skype online status information, you get the benefit of Skype’s awareness of user presence. You can see who is available to call or chat, and also change your own online status to let others know that you are free to interact with them. iSkoot allows you to talk to anyone around the world from your S60 device and offers network service in over 40 countries. Calling is as easy as just clicking on a contact on your S60 device.

Two weeks ago, John Halamka – Chief Information Officer at Harvard Medical School and the CareGroup Health System (to name a few)– named iSkoot for Skype as his “Cool Technology of the Week.” Using his Blackberry Curve 8320 he has also figured out how to use "local" pay-as-you-go: SIM cards to reduce or eliminate roaming charges while traveling abroad.

The iSkoot client places a regular local phone call to an iSkoot gateway server, then the gateway server places a Skype call, bypassing all long distance charges. While connected to the iSkoot gateway, the iSkoot client enables you to

* See who is signed in and view their online status
* Manage your own online status
* Click to call a contact
* Click to chat with a contact
* Make low-cost calls to any phone number, anywhere in the world using SkypeOut
* Receive calls from Skype users
* Add or remove friends from your contact list
* Refresh your contact list automatically or on demand

And finally, Alec Saunders of iotum where, amongst other titles he is Chief SquawkBox Officer, recently spent three weeks in Europe traveling with his family. Having been supplied with a 3 Skypephone, he came home saying that he found the 3 Skypephone was the most consistent means for him to maintain the limited degree of connectivity he required while on a family vacation.

Previous iSkoot posts:

• Skype on Mobile: North American Carriers' Backhaul is the Ultimate Bottleneck
• What VoIP on Mobile Can Learn from SS7
• iSkoot - Providing Carrier Friendly Access for Skype Calls.
• eComm 2008: iSkoot Presentation
• Mobile VoIP Services -- The Ergonomics of Making a Call Counts...
• Skypephone 2 at 3 August 18?

Hat tip to the iSkoot blog for pointing us to these recognitions.

Tags: iSkoot, Skype, John Halamka, Nokia, S60, Alec Saunders, SquawkBox, iotum

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 01:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

How do you discover what people really do with your software? Our behavior often differs from what we think we do. The human-computer interaction research method eye tracking can reveal where a user's attention goes when they use a product.

Two days after Skype launched the Skype for Windows 4.0 Beta in June 2008, Cimex, a British firm with a usability and accessibility lab, spent a day watching people use Skype. Then wrote them up. I'm including the full text of their report below the fold. From their blog:

A usability study by Cimex has revealed Skype’s new Beta release may prove difficult to use, due to weaknesses in presentation, navigation, structure and functionality.

The aim of this study was to capture the users’ expectations, needs and preferences, all of which we believe can be used as a base to create a more engaging, efficient and effective Skype application.

Caveats:

• Only six users were tested: 25-50 years' old; British, French, Greek; three newbies, three experienced Skypers; three men, three women. This is not representative of Skype's worldwide user community. Skypers come in all ages, speak many languages and bring wildly different cultural norms to software use.
  
  The team said "A larger sample would allow us to perform more detailed quantitative data analysis of the performance rates."  A larger sample would also "allow us to create more targeted scenarios and cover all the range of Skype user profiles."

• The study was relatively shallow since few user goals were tested in the time available, and many product features were unexplored. See the sidebar for four user goals.

Four of the twelve tasks used in the study

Could you please have a look at this welcome screen and tell me what your first impressions are? What would be the first thing you would like to do from here? (Users were allowed to explore the options of the welcome screen and then asked to start using the application.)

What are you impressions by looking at this page of the application? Do you like the way the information is presented?

Let’s have a look at the top menu (Skype, Contacts, Conversation, etc). Are these options meaningful enough to you? Without clicking on them yet, could you please tell me what do you expect to find under each of these menu options?

Imagine now, that you want to invite a friend who hasn’t got a Skype account, to join Skype. How would you do that?

Observing users with eye tracking is best applied iteratively and with a specific problem in mind. Feedback from one round can reveal a problem which, once cleared, reveals other obstacles to people doing what they set out to do.

I'd be curious how these results compare with the 3.8 release; has 4's redesign addressed many of 3.X's problems with complexity and discovery?

Unlike many other products, Skype comes in many flavors, like the mobile edition on the Skypephone or Skype for the Nokia tablets. You might learn a great deal by testing goal success (e.g. "Call this phone number", "IM a friend on your buddy list", "start a video call") across operating systems and devices.

So here's the Skype Journal Daily Question: What are the top three design goals you see in Skype 4b?

See also:

• Skype's videos about the 4.0 beta limited release

• Skype 4.0 for Windows Beta 1 -- Call for User Feedback

• Mike Bartlett Discusses Skype 4.0 Beta on Squawk Box

• Mike Bartlett Comments on Skype 4.0 User Feedback

Download the Usability Study of Skype 4.0 in PDF format or read the web version below...

Skype 4.0 Beta usability review

1. Introduction

This report contains the results of a short series of user testing sessions, carried out by Cimex on the new version of Skype, namely the Skype 4.0 Beta 1 release. Our brief usability study has revealed many of the difficulties users faced, due to weaknesses in the presentation, navigation, structure and functionality of this widely used application.

Figure 1. The first page of Skype application.

2. Aims and Objectives

The aim of this study was to capture the users’ expectations, needs and preferences all of which can be used as a base to create a more engaging, efficient and effective Skype application. The key objectives were to:

• Explore users’ experiences and expectations based on their previous use of Skype.
• Assess the usability of Skype 4.0 Beta 1 version by users performing typical tasks with the application.
• Assess if the information presented and the functionality are appropriate for the target audience.
• Capture the users’ reactions and preferences for style and design ideas for the application.

3. Methodology

For the purpose of this study, the qualified User Experience team at Cimex carried out six individual user testing sessions, which took place at the Cimex specialised usability labs in Central London. Each session lasted 60 minutes and consisted of four main areas:

Pre-session interview

The purpose of this first exercise was to make the user feels comfortable with the testing and to gather useful information about the user’s expectations and their previous experience with Skype, or other similar applications which are based on VoIP (Voice translated into data) or IM (Instant messaging) technology.

Task performance with Eye Tracking

In the next part of the session, each participant was asked to complete a set of twelve tasks on Skype, while the eye tracking device recorded their initial eye movements. These were typical tasks based on “real-life” scenarios, for example “Imagine that you want to invite a friend to join Skype. How would you do that?” The user was encouraged to think aloud and share their thoughts as they interacted with the application.

Figure 2. A user testing session at Cimex usability lab

Post-session interview

After the task performance with the eye tracking, the post-session interview was conducted to learn the user’s overall thoughts and conclusions on using the application.

Design

The final section of the session was to gather feedback on the design of the application by capturing the user’s opinion and reactions about the overall “look and feel”, style and colour of the Skype application.

4. Participants

A total of six participants took part in the current testing. The participants were representative of typical Skype users and those who were keen to learn more about Skype. In particular, two of the users had never used Skype before, two had used Skype a few times, and the other two used Skype on a regular basis. The sample included three male and three female, and they were between 25 to 40 years old.

5. Data Analysis

Qualitative analysis was used to analyse the information obtained from the user testing sessions, and gaze plot analysis was used to analyse the data collected with the eye tracker. The data analysis was based on the users’ reactions and comments during the interviews and the interaction with application, as well as on their ability to perform the given tasks.

6. Results

Pre-session Interview

People who had never used Skype before expected to find clear instructions on how to use Skype services, a simple interface and information about the costs.

Free Skype-to-Skype calls and cheap international calls were considered the most popular services by the existing Skype users, whereas conference calls and file transferring were described problematic.

Task Performance

Task performance revealed many important findings which indicated the numerous problematic areas in the presentation, navigation, structure and functionality of Skype 4.0 Beta. Some of the key findings are described below:

Figure 3. Content was overlapped when the window size was decreased.

a. Finding: The size of the application’s window was described as unnecessarily big and the content was overlapped when the users tried to decrease it.

Recommendation: Allow users to select a desirable window size without the content being overlapped.

Figure 4. The conversation window had many unclear icons.

b. Finding: The purpose of many icons was considered not obvious and unclear.

Recommendation: Provide intuitive and distinct icons, and ensure that their purpose is not misinterpreted by looking similar to other buttons.

Figure 5. The search for contacts had no option for advanced searching or sorting the search results.

c. Finding: Users wanted to be able to narrow down the search for contacts and also to sort the search results easily.

Recommendation: Ensure the contacts search facility is effective and provides intuitive advanced search and filtering methods.

d. Finding: It was not clear when a contact was finally added to the user’s list as no confirmation message was given.

Recommendation: Provide appropriate feedback through clearly defined messages to keep users informed about what is going on.

e. Finding: All the users wondered how they could view their credit balance.

Recommendation: Make important information, such as the user’s credit balance, visible and accessible at any point throughout the application. Eye Tracking The image below demonstrates an example scan path extracted by the eye tracking analysis. The blue dots are fixations that indicate where the eyes looked to process information. Larger dots show that more time has been spent looking at the elements on the screen.

Figure 6. An example of an eye tracking scan path for the first page.

f. Finding: During the first seconds of viewing the first page, all of the users’ attention has been attracted by the right area of the screen, without noticing the important options on the left.

Recommendation: Enhance the application’s presentation so that users will not spend unnecessary time and get disappointed while trying to detect the options that will allow them to start using the application.

Post-session interview

Overall the application was considered very useful and easy to use but with a potential for improvement. In general, users wanted a better interface design, clearer navigation mechanisms, and also highlighted the importance of accessing their credit balance at any time. Design Although some users supported that they did not have many design expectations from this kind of applications, a better layout with smaller window size and more intuitive icons was considered necessary by everyone.

Figure 7. Users’ comments on the design of the conversation page.

7. Conclusion

Our usability study demonstrated how the contribution of real users can reveal a number of significant findings and recommendations. The Skype 4.0 Beta 1 was overall described useful and easy to use, but with poor layout, not obvious icons, unclear navigation and information structure. For that reason, an exploration of alternative solutions to the site structure and naming conventions to provide a more intuitive and efficient user experience is considered essential. The outcomes of this study can be used as the foundation for building a more intuitive, engaging and efficient new version of the popular web application.

If you want more information about Cimex's usability lab, contact:

Andrew Japp, Business Development Manager
Cimex, 53-55 Scrutton Street, London UK, EC2A 4PJ
T: +44 (0)20 7324 7780
E: andrew.japp AT cimex DOT com
www.cimex.com

Posted by Phil Wolff at 09:34 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The Skype Dance

See also:

•  Skype Dance call tutorial (04:25)
•  Skype Dancing (01:29)
•  skype dance (00:22)
•  Skype Dancer (00:33)
•  dance with me. skype serie 1 (01:42)

Posted by Phil Wolff at 03:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

This is another in my catch-up series (first post here) - and I'm slow in getting a second one out. About three weeks ago Phil and I wrote three posts about SightSpeed's new partnership with Dell where SightSpeed is providing the infrastructure for Dell Video Chat. In my second post I discussed the role CxO's play in bringing business to technology. This triggered SightSpeed CEO Peter Csathy to write a  post: Speculation about SightSpeed's Partnership Success - "How Do They Do It?" Peter talks about other partnerships SightSpeed has built over the past five years:

It may surprise many folks that we also have long established partnerships with Microsoft, Intel, AMD, Ask.com, Creative, VTEL, Ezonics and others, as well as long-standing relationships with major media companies like Viacom (MTV and Nickelodeon) and Disney (ABC News).

and goes on to talk about how SightSpeed powered, for MTV, the first Internet video and webcam infrastructure that allowed home viewers to participate live on-the-air. More recently we have seen Skype's High Quality Video being used by Oprah to do live interviews from homes and other remote locations.

But more importantly Peter goes on to discuss four key factors in successful partnering:

• You must be best in class period
• You must be flexible, open and standards-based
• You must be built to partner, partnership friendly and partnership proven
• You must have the right team and passion

No argument with the first and last. With respect to the second, while the past decade has opened up new worlds, through technology development, for partnering, the technology business world is still learning the balancing act where it can be open and where it can effectively use proprietary technology. Bottom line to me with any communications service is "can I easily make the connection and have a conversation that is transparent to the technology?"

With respect to the third, I can now talk in retrospect from experience in my Quarterdeck days. QEMM was architected as one interlinked software "blob" such that we missed many OEM opportunities for potential partners who wanted what amounted to an API to only a few individual features. Architecting software for partnership has become a fundamental business development criteria. But partnership is also about building business partnerships where the "rules of the game" are adequately defined and agreed upon, where business standards, in addition to technology standards, are established and met and where successful execution happens almost spontaneously.

Read Peter's post in its entirety; lots of experience and lessons that can help everyone in today's highly interwoven technology businesses.

(Photo taken during a meeting with Peter at CES 2008)

Tags: SightSpeed, Peter Csathy, Skype High Quality Video, QEMM, MTV, Oprah, partnerships, business development

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 04:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Open Web Foundation launched today. Anything that helps more projects survive the path from concept to adoption is fantastic. The OWF is tackling several human barriers to technical success.

• Legal barriers. Great projects have been stalled for many quarters because contributions to their work product (designs, sample code, specification, etc.) were not cleared. OWF will host projects where all contributions are cleared up front. So the final product arrives unencumbered by patents, trademarks, and other claims.

• Antisocial parents. It's not enough to reveal your great insight to the world. Throwing your newborn specification over the wall usually results in a stillborn flash in the pan. OpenWeb will help innovators foster community around their ideas. So the new product is "owned" by an open community, so it receives diverse and worldly inputs, and learns, adapts, and flourishes independent of its instigators. Ready to survive in the wild.

• Startup Governance. To incorporate or not? Where? In what form? Who holds our IP? How do we take money? OpenWeb will help with this class of problem by sharing templates for organizing and being a corporate umbrella for select projects.

Active customer service discussions in Open Web Foundation

• Can't sign in with OpenID17 minutes ago
• What about autonomo.us?about 2 hours ago
• Open in name but not in spirit?about 2 hours ago
• What are the requirements for participating as an individual?about 2 hours ago
• What is the Open Web Foundation?about 3 hours ago

Get Satisfaction support network

Implicit in all this is the shared belief that the Internet's plumbing is best served by public protocols and the culture of open source. Skype and other companies with software/web platforms may benefit from OWF's resources, peer experience, and processes to rehabilitate their developer relations programs.

Conceived in May 2008, OWF is a seed today. It needs work to build those resources. Get started by joining the Open Web Foundation discussion group. Ask questions on OpenWeb's Get Satisfaction Q&A service.

P.S. I'm spending today at the World Open Space on Open Space 2008 event with Kaliya Hamlin, who's done her bit to promote the dialog that led to OWF. Like the OWF, OSoOS is all about the human side of getting things done, specifically designing rich face to face experiences.

P.P.S. One last thought. I recently joined the first DataPortability.org Steering Group [note to self: be careful what you wish for], taking on some responsibility for achieving a data portable world ("Your Onlife, Everywhere!" TM pending). While we haven't voted on it, the sense of the Data Portability community is the Open Web Foundation is a milestone in Internet history. I expect the breadth, depth, and creativity of technology innovation to widen, deepen, and accelerate under OWF's auspices. More great ideas will survive on their merits, not die on the shoals of bureaucracy, open culture naiveté, or cash flow. The web needs this, the world needs this.

The Open Web Foundation begins today.

Congratulations to all of you who've worked to get us here. 

Now the work begins.

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Slides from David Recordon's OSCON announcement in Portland, Oregon, this morning.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 12:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Roadcasting. Joel Moye, a South Carolina truck driver, streams video and IMs while driving in the American South. Friends read chat room comments to him over Skype. You can follow his GPS. If nothing else, it makes the road less lonely.

Toolkit: a laptop, the Gateway Notebook Model: MT6728. A CabCam visor facing the driver's seat and a visor mount looking forward through the front windscreen are dual Logitech QuickCam Communicate STXs. Garmin USB 18 GPS Cable with GpsGate Installed. Connectivity via an AT&T PCMCIA Laptop Connect Card (Sierra Wireless Aircard 875) and USB Connect (Sierra Wireless USBConnect 881) 3G Wireless Broadband. Justin.tv for streaming the audio and video.

You can also follow Joel on twitter for his presence ("I'm broadcasting live to my Justin.tv channel! Check me out at www.justin.tv/joelmoye?59").

Others roadcast too. Patriot Certified Pilot Cars, New England, and Certified Pilot Cars ("The Master Roadcaster™"), Florida, stream video so clients can see how they safely escort oversize and wide load trucks down the road. 

Posted by Phil Wolff at 09:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

While I can find no press release from any of Skype, iSkoot or 3, it appears there was some 3 media event yesterday where it was announced that 3 will be introducing a new Skypephone 2 on August 18. Key new features include:

• 3G mobile broadband supporting HSDPA
• a 3.2 Mpixel camera (vs the current 2.0 Mpixel)
• integration of Skype contacts into the phone's address book
• support for email (post-launch date)
• software to allow the Skypephone to be used as a modem when plugged into a PC (tethering)
• slightly larger screen (2.2 inch QVGA)
• RSS feed support
• a built-in Facebook application
• pricing of £69.95 on Pay-As-You-Go or free for contract customers

Chris Dawson at TameBay saw one yesterday:

The Skypephone however is the only handset in the world that has Skype built-in as an “always on” embedded tool rather than as an add-on application. That means it doesn’t eat into your data allowance and 3 allows a generous 4,000 Skype minutes and 10,000 Skype chat messages a month for free on the Skypephone.

At this same event it was also confirmed that 3 will be carrying the Blackberry Bold (where you have a full QWERTY keyboard for handling email and other keyboard-intensive activities).

Not exactly a quiet summer for smartphone introductions!

Tags: Skype, Skypephone, 3

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 06:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Update: It appears that yesterday 3 made some forward looking product lineup announcements that included the launch of Skypephone 2 and Blackberry Bold. On reading some of the coverage I have to wonder if some reporters and/or bloggers got the two products erroneously "interlinked" and seemed to conclude with the rumor that is now spreading on the blogosphere and for which I have addressed some misconceptions about VoIP over wireless carriers below. Also I have to question the entire way in which PR on this was handled; normally I would expect co-announcements from Skype and iSkoot.

Blackberry Cool is floating a rumor that the U.K's 3 network,  the only carrier currently selling Skypephone - a hit in the youth market, will be selling the Blackberry Bold with a Skype client.

First problem, it is known that VoIP over 3G networks still has quality, robustness and latency issues that make them unsuitable for running a native Skype client. Can we ever convince the media that VoIP over any current wireless data protocol is a non-starter?

This issue was confirmed when Truphone, after months of researching a native VoIP client over 3G, recently launched their Truphone Anywhere service that allows you to make Truphone calls over a GSM/EDGE/3G network using the data channel for text messaging and call signaling while using the robust, scalable inherent voice channel for the voice conversation. As a result you have two wireless options for Truphone: (i) VoIP over WiFi or (ii) Truphone Anywhere over 3G (and, from personal experience, I can confirm it works on 2.5G/EDGE as well). I have had several occasions to make calls using Truphone over WiFi - on my evaluation Nokia N95 - resulting in low cost or free calls from WiFi access points, especially when in the U.S.where my Rogers roaming charges would be $0.95 per minute.

So let's stop all talk of having a full Skype VoIP client running over any 3G wireless service.

And, of course we know that 3 has a previous relationship with Skype and iSkoot, who build the software behind the Skypephone. So the real question is "Will we see an iSkoot implementation on the Blackberry Bold?" I can vouch that I have been using iSkoot on my Blackberry 8820 for some time; it's really useful to keep up with Skype chat session during commuter trips and, when in Toronto, I can make calls to Skype contacts simply for the cost of "local" minutes. (Once away from Toronto, I am charged for long distance back to Toronto, where iSkoot has an access PoP.)

Certainly, after seeing the Blackberry Bold's display last week, I can see the opportunity for a very interesting Skype client, handling Skype IM and call signaling on the Bold. For Skype IM, one would have a full QWERTY keyboard for heavy IM, and Twitter activities.

Well, it makes for an interesting rumor; only time will tell. And, how does this tie in with today's announcement from 3 of Skypephone 2? (More in a follow up post.) Given that Skype's fifth anniversary is coming up at the end of August, maybe we can expect some interesting announcements in the next six weeks or so.

Tags: Skype, 3, Skypephone, iSkoot, Blackberry Bold, Truphone, Truphone Anywhere, Blackberry Cool

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 02:46 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Over the past couple of weeks, during which I have taken a vacation and then dealt with an internal network issue at my home office, there has been no holiday on news related to the IP Communications space. So this week I will offer a series of posts talking about communications from Skype's new executive team, about building strong partnerships in an IP-based communications space, about the role of API's and finally about our mobile-enabled world. Each of the players I reference will have a significant impact on how the world of IP-based communications and real time conversations will evolve. Let's, however, start with Skype.

Towards the end of June, Skype announced the appointment of Scott Durschlag as Chief Operating Officer, responsible for the day-to-day execution of Skype's offerings and programs. COO's are usually not in themselves corporate visionaries but latch on to a vision and ensure that it can be executed to bring a "delightful user experience" while building  a profitable business. RIM's COO for Blackberry, Don Morrison, is an excellent example here¹. While RIM co-CEO Jim Balsille sets the business strategy and co-CEO Mike Lazardis builds technology strategy based on his early vision for wireless devices going back to 1992, Don is a seasoned telecom executive who is responsible for building and managing a customer-driven organization worldwide, including the distribution partnerships, carrier relationships, ISV programs and enterprise support programs that have contributed to RIM's ongoing success. (Full disclosure: Don and I are graduates of the same business school.) RIM also has a COO for Administration and Operations, Dennis Kavelman, responsible for the operations side of RIM's manufacturing and customer information infrastructure services. While critical to the success of RIM, neither of these COO's is in the prime spotlight when it comes to discussions about RIM but they are mission critical to making things happen. All this to set the expectations of the role that new Skype COO, Scott Durschlag, is expected to play in ensuring that Skype executes for success..

Scott was recently interviewed by Harold Wolinsky on what message he has for current customers and what got him excited enough to want to join Skype in this role:

• The remarkable team at Skype and what they have developed to date
• The current climate where not only global warming but also rising gas prices are causing us to rethink when we have to travel and how we communicate with both our friends and our business colleagues
• The paradigm shift in communications from hardware to software. "Software owns the future in communications". (Thus, my forthcoming post about the API discussions raging on the blogosphere.)
• The untapped revenue potential where Skype currently is running at a (profitable) $500 million annual run rate in a multi-trillion dollar market space.

His message for the developer community (in an era where both Apple and RIM have set new, but different, business models for delivering third party applications to the consumer and enterprise respectively):

If there is one thing I have learned about developers from my experience in mobile, it's that they are at the absolute cutting edge of what can be done. Some of things we never think of are invented by some young developer trying to create cool things for himself and his friends. You really want to be able to make it as easy as possible and as economically rewarding as possible for those folks to be innovating around your product.

The interview goes on to discuss his message for Skype employees and where Skype goes next. Read it for the details.

At this point, Scott's challenge amounts to demonstrating execution -- building on Skype's innovation in software by structuring and executing on compelling partner programs that drive third party innovation as well as delivering more effective support programs that "delight the user". But the most crying need is to create broader market awareness of the potential for IP-based communications through integrating the rollout of the innovative software technology with more effective marketing practices - in a timely manner. Communicating effectively to Skype's user base and target audience along with rebuilding once again the viral enthusiasm that lead to Skype's initial market acceptance and deployment have to be the key goals here. Individually each of these goals is a challenge but also Scott will be measured by how well he can coordinate these activities such that Skype breaks down the disconnects that have occurred in the past between engineering, marketing and business development. Scott may have had success at Motorola with the RAZR (but where Motorola did not invest in future development); the question today is can he bring his experience at Motorola and elsewhere to build Skype's ongoing, sustainable success?

And the bottom line for both Josh and Skype will be whether they can build enough value into Skype over the next twelve to eighteen months to either make Skype either a major profitable eBay business unit or an attractive acquisition by a third party at a reasonable profit relative to eBay's past investments in Skype.

¹RIM Executive Team Bios

Tags: Skype, Scott Durschlag, RIM, Don Morrison, Jim Balsille, Mike Lazardis, Dennis Kavelman

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 09:11 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Sue Bailey at TameBay saw a Skype survey that asked about ad sponsored SkypeOut calling.

"Skype is thinking of playing a sponsored voice message just before making your call. Could you indicate for each sponsored message duration to what extent this would bother you?"

Durations: <5 seconds, 5-7, 8-10, 11-15, 16-20, 20-25, 25-30.

Degrees of pain:

• "I would find this so annoying I would not use this service"

• "I would find this annoying, but would use this service anyway"

• "I would not find this annoying"

• "It would be nice to hear the voice message"

The gap between how you think you'll feel (what you disclose in a survey) and your actual experience and behavior can be huge. (Let me know if you sign up for a pilot; the results should reveal more about the viability of voice/video ad injection by market and demographic.)

Ad supported calls to businesses might appeal to some Skypers, just to overcome the cost of calling.

However "toll free" services, where the recipient pays for incoming calls, may be more attractive and less intrusive.

P.S. Personally, I'd add to the survey:

• "It would offend me so much that I would tell all my friends to switch to another service"

• "This is so painful that I would join a boycott of advertisers"

• "I would call people just to hear the ads"

• "I want to play ads in the middle of calls so we can all enjoy the ad together"

• "I'd rather be offered a gallery of text, audio and video ads/coupons for this company or this category to view at my leisure"

Posted by Phil Wolff at 07:53 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Send faxes via PamFax for €0.14 (a 17% reduction) or, if on a PamFax Professional or PrePaid Pack plan, as low as €0.09.

Since last summer Skype Journal has been reporting on the evolution of PamFax, which allows Skype users to send faxes anywhere worldwide from your laptop in as few as five mouse clicks. Source documents can be locally scanned hard copy or electronic documents in any of 100 file formats, including Office and PDF documents. PamFax can also act as a Windows printer. This weekend last summer's Skype Mashup Contest winner has added several new features:

• An interface for both Facebook and Salesforce.com. The Facebook interface provides your PamFax history and has a link to launch PamFax to send another fax. If you have activated a "still-in-beta" version of the Skype Toolbar for Firefox, the PamFax "Click-to-Fax" icon becomes activated. If you're a Facebook member, you can add the Facebook interface here.

In Salesforce.com, the integration goes much further: You not only have the fax history embedded in Salesforce, but you also have the ability to start a fax from any Contact, Account, User or Lead! So no more copy&paste to send a fax to one of your contacts, as PamFax starts with name and fax number prefilled and you only have to select what you want to fax and then send the fax.

• Improved startup and performance speeds. PamConsult has invested heavily in infrastructure that accelerates the startup time (probably the major feedback complaint) and also makes the entire faxing process much more responsive. To take advantage of this feature you will need to upgrade to PamFax 1.0.0.34 client, either manually from the PamFax Home page or, after next weekend once Skype has released a new version of the Skype Extras Gallery, an automatic upgrade when you launch PamFax.
  
• The most significant announcement this weekend is a price reduction for Pay-As-You-Go users and Premium Packs for frequent or high volume users. Highlights:
  • Pay-As-You-Go: has been reduced from €0.17 to €0.14 (~US$0.22¹) for Zone 1 faxes with reductions to other destination zones as well.
  • PamFax Professional Plan: €2.95 (~US$4.70) per month provides a 35% discount of standard page pricing, starting at €0.09 for Zone 1.
  • Prepaid Packs: buy a pack and get a "per fax" discount. Starts at 10% for a €30 Pack to 40% for a €1000 Pack.

Having grown from 25,000 registered users back in April to over 52,000 users today, primarily in the U.S., U.K., Australia, Italy, Germany, Russia and France, PamFax is definitely filling a user need, especially for both the road warrior who needs to send a fax from any Internet connection and situations where hard copy needs to be exchanged instantly in a trackable manner. About 40% of users are paying via Skype credits while others are paying via PayPal or Amazon Payments.

Previous PamFax Posts:

• PamFax Receives Skype Certification, Grows Usage
• PamFax to the Rescue
• Mashup Champion PamFax Becomes a Full Fax Sending Solution
• PamFax: Sending Faxes via Skype

¹US$ conversions based on current rates (€1.00 = US$1.585) and are subject to currency market changes.

Tags: PamFax, PamConsult, Skype, PayPal, Amazon Payment, Fax Service, Fax

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 05:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

The Dark Night (2008), the latest Batman picture is full of moral challenges. One of them is the mobile-phone-powered surveillance state.

Wayne Enterprises backdoors mobile phone hardware throughout Gotham City, enabling continuous audio surveillance and location reporting. A WE computer system filters all the streams, matching against samples of Joker's voice. This is all for Batman, not for the corrupted Gotham Police Department. 

Lucius Fox, CEO of WE, tells Bruce Wayne this is too much power for one man. Wayne agrees and destroys the system after one of the Joker's arrests.

Before we leap from fiction to reality:

• Does the potential exist for turning-on mobile phones without the owner's consent? Turning citizens into open microphones?

• With enough money, could you build the filters to match voices or listen for words/phrases in near real time?

And then the design constraints...

• What pressures could be brought to bear upon the operators of such a system?

• What systemic resistance could you build into a system so it is not abused? so it is not abusable?

• Could you architect the mobile network to prevent the construction and operation of such a system?

In our real world,

• police complain Skype is too encrypted for on-the-fly wire taps,

• Google is creating a new mobile phone operating system,

• Nokia is community-sourcing Symbian,

• Apple is buying its own semiconductor fabrication factories, and

• US phone companies break faith with customers, giving private customer data to spy agencies without FISA court compulsion.

If industry has the power to both enable private surveillance and prevent it, where do its obligations lay? As citizens, what is our responsibility?

Posted by Phil Wolff at 06:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

On Wednesday eBay released their quarterly financial results, including an update on Skype usage. This chart presents the trend lines over the past year.

The only other information that came out in the call:

• Over 25% of all Skype-to-Skype calls involve video
• Skype is "double-digit" profitable (along with PayPal)

Comments:

• It is apparent that the MySpace agreement contributed to the accelerated growth in Q4-07.
• For the first time, during this quarter, the daily growth volume itself has dropped off.
• While Skype-to-Skype minutes tracked along with increased accounts in the previous two quarters, why have the growth of these minutes dropped significantly to 4% in a quarter where new account registrations rose by 9%? (And the Skype-to-Skype minutes growth rate itself dropped off significantly.)
• This usage level is consistent with the fact that concurrent online users still has not passed 13 million at its daily peak, yet grew significantly from 10 to 12 million in the previous quarter.
• U.S. revenue growth has definitely stalled; yet international continues to move forward.

But here is the big question:

• Account registrations grew by 28..9 million accounts in the past quarter
• According to Hudson Barton's "Real User" estimates (which are somewhat consistent with the "concurrent users online" numbers in terms of growth) Skype usage has only grown by 2 to 3 million "real users".

What has happened such that the other 26 million to 27 million "new accounts" are effectively inactive?

• I recall that, when WinFax Lite used to be offered in almost every software package in the mid-90's, the upgrade rate used to be about 1% go 2% and was consistent with most "free introductions" of popular PC software
• Here we do see here a take-up rate of about 10% to 15%, so certainly this growth is consistent with Skype having a "free" offering for Skype-to-Skype calls.
• New account registrations is not necessarily reflective of new users as a single user can have multiple accounts for various reasons. And, as with all user data bases, the longer term information incorporated into this number goes stale over time.

The Skype 4.0 beta program has been designed to build into the user experience feedback from both legacy and new users. But there has to be more than the user interface as a factor involved that leads to this relatively low take-up rate. Candidates for consideration could include:

• End point user configurations that lead to bad experiences?
• Attempts to install on too many sub-1GHz PC's?
• Bad end user network connections?
• Poor quality "home" routers that cannot handle voice packets in real time appropriately?
• Insufficient or incomplete technical support resources?

Let's hope Skype's market research moves beyond simply drilling down on the user interface experience. This is definitely a statistic that needs further investigation. Definitely I have had good to excellent experience with Skype, including video calling, over time but does that have to do with my own configuration which I tend to upgrade from time-to-time? Am I too "technically competent"?

And this discrepancy is one more reason why eBay should be reporting the number of users who actually made a Skype call during the "reported" quarter. This would be much closer to the real picture of Skype usage. As with MacDonald's "over X billion sold" where it represents real hamburgers, it is only fair to provide both shareholders and analysts with a much meatier picture. (All the publicly listed telcos have no problem providing this information.) The number of active SkypeOut accounts would also supply a better handle.

This is both a challenge and the "missed opportunity" for Skype's new management team to address. And maybe an issue for not only eBay's investor relations activities but also at some point it may draw the attention of the SEC.

Sorry folks, but I can provide some practical case situations involving companies reporting "vague" or inconsistent numbers; the final outcomes were not pretty. In this case the reported data is not fraudulent nor would this data, at the current Skype revenue level as a % of eBay revenues, severely impact eBay's financial results but it is misrepresentation of the true Skype picture.

Tags: Skype, eBay, Hudson Barton, Borderless Communicator, eBay Q2-08 financial results, MySpace

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 10:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

I'll be iBold enough to say that, applying physics terminology so much appreciated by RIM's co-CEO, Blackberry Bold will reduce the half-life of the iPhone in the business and prosumer market by an order of magnitude.

Tuesday evening I attended RIM's annual shareholders meeting in Waterloo at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, initially funded by RIM co-CEO Mike Lazaradis. A full house in the lecture theatre, including many RIM managers, all the Waterloo Region residents who had invested in RIM and the usual assortment of analysts and media. Full disclosure; this was my eleventh RIM AGM - the last ten as a shareholder of a minute quantity. More importantly RIM has become one of the most highly capitalized companies in Canada, competing with the Royal Bank for highest market capitalization on the Toronto Stock Exchange. RIM is to the Canadian technology scene what Nokia is to Finland and Skype to Estonia. From numbers heard at the AGM about 7,000 of their close to 10,000 employees are Canadians.

I attend each of these meetings, not simply to catch up with some acquaintances who participate, but mainly to listen to co-CEO Mike Lazaradis' overview of the RIM's technology and platform development. He has a way to articulate the technology within the framework of the the end user experience, developer program requirements, five nines availability, battery life, carrier benefits and other factors that have lead to their success. Coming out of the presentation, which largely focused on the forthcoming Blackberry Bold, I learned about:

• the Bold's high-resolution (HVGA 480 x 320) display with a widescreen format and integrated lens technology.
• the new Blackberry browser (yes, you can flick your thumb to zoom without leaving thumb oil on the display cover)
• a new Clock application, complete with "bedside" mode; the picture to the right only gives a hint of what's in store here.
• Blackberry Unite! allowing families, "friend groups", and workgroups to communicate and share in many ways beyond voice and text via their Blackberries and desktops
• Blackberry Bold's true GPS (that works with navigation software) but most importantly not only supports A-GPS to facilitate in-building location but also offers "Fast GPS Fix Times" - traditionally an issue with most GPS-based navigation devices.
• the extent of the Blackberry Enterprise platform that includes not only desktop (email/PIM) activities but also voice systems that allow your Blackberry to become simply an extension of the enterprise phone system, intranet web services involving SAP, Oracle IBM Websphere and all the current web services platforms and protocols and, finally, integration with real time enterprise collaboration services such as Lotus Sametime and MS Live CommunicationsServer.
• Blackberry's security validations with NATO and several national governments
• Blackberry Partners Fund to finance third party software development partners.
• The extent of Blackberry's Developer programs with both prosumer general use offerings (via, say, Handango) and vertical enterprise applications.
• On the personal entertainment side, Blackberry's new Media Sync creates a direct connection between your iTunes music collection and the Blackberry. (and will also be made available to all Blackberry devices with a media card - Pearl, Curve, 88xx - through both a firmware and desktop software upgrade).

In response to one question about why RIM will continue to prosper, Mike explained how RIM now has many years of experience in dealing with the laws of physics related to understanding both the mobile and wireless environment in which they have to operate. Wireless spectrum management, rf transmit/receive technology (across 7 bands in the Blackberry Bold), an operating system optimized for wireless data devices, data management that optimizes compression while minimizing packets transported over the wireless connections with no information loss are amongst the issues that RIM understands most succinctly. It's what has allowed them to be able to provide longer battery life, increase the rf range and provide the overall reliability required to satisfy a broader range of, especially enterprise customer, needs. Not only are the end user needs considered but also carriers have demands on minimizing bandwidth while providing quality voice and reliable data exchange. Nobody need look to any outsource supplier for key rf and chip technology information beyond the various Intel processors incorporated into the Blackberry; most of the rest is all built in-house. It is this "legacy" experience in dealing with these laws of physics that gives RIM a significant lead in its ability to offer compelling new devices such as the Blackberry Bold and to keep open a window of opportunity for unique new applications and user needs.

Following the meeting a RIM employee demonstrated to me a couple of the Bold's features. Better at this point to reference a comment made by Boy Genius in his recent pre-release review of Blackberry Bold:

We said this before, but this really is the screen to beat. It might be a little too “contrasty” at times, if you know what we mean, but overall, it steals the show. It is the most vibrant, color-rich, sharp screen we’ve ever seen on a mobile device.

To which I can only say, Amen! An astonishingly stunning HVGA (480 x320) display approaching 200 dpi resolution. I watched a Star Wars action segment and an auto racing clip. You really have to see it to understand how impressive its HD video quality is. But then I saw how this display's features were applied to Office documents. A complaint about previous Blackberries has been the lack of an ability to display email attachments. The Blackberry Bold not only has the capability to display Office document attachments but does it in a manner that blows away any previous "minimalist" experience with, say, spreadsheets on handhelds. You can actually do some reasonably significant spreadsheet activity on it. Having seen this I could only react by saying that this is one key feature that will sustain Blackberry's lead in the business and prosumer markets. Apparently there is also a way to manage the display of Power Point presentations onto an overhead projector (details unknown).

And to check out one more aspect of the Blackberry ecosystem: determine what applications were available for my current Blackberry 8820, I went to Handango and selected my model.

Between the unpublicized infrastructure mentioned above for supporting the wireless-enabled enterprise and the features I saw Tuesday evening, I can only say that Blackberry Bold will significantly disrupt Apple's efforts to enter the business market. The iPhone is left with two markets: younger generation consumers who want an expensive toy and Mac aficionados who can use the iPhone as an extension of their Mac experience.

• Crackberry.com lists the Bold's features and specifications.
• Crackberry.com's reviews of Blackberry Bold.
• In a related story about carrier data plans: Score One for the Blogosphere - Immense PR Turmoil - Rogers Caves. Did prospective iPhone users raise such a fuss because the iPhone is not as efficient at handling wireless data?

Tags: Research in Motion, RIM, Blackberry, Blackberry Bold, iPhone, Mike Lazaradis, Handango, Crackberry.com, Perimeter Institute, Blackberry Unite!

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 04:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Just a heads-up:

What:
eBay's Q2 2008 Earnings Call
Times are Pacific (GMT-8). This is the investor webcast and presentation for eBay's Q2 2008. Skype is an eBay company. eBay is traded on the NASDAQ exchange. (NASD:EBAY)

When:
Wednesday, July 16, 2008 2:00 PM to 3:00 PM Pacific

Where:
Join us in Skype Journal's Investor Relations Chat for live commentary (and to while away the time between the Skype parts.)

Posted by Phil Wolff at 02:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

This is for IPEVO's Caroline Andreolle who chatted: 

"love the law and order post!!! can't wait to have one where they're like... wheeler? the perp's on skype right now!!"

Caroline, I'm not making this up. In today's news...

Michael Birkeland, a comedic actor and generally well-liked guy, was arrested Friday for stealing a laptop from Utah Valley University. The instructor Skyped his stolen laptop, the MacBook Pro answered with video, he saw Birkeland, recognized him from a classroom visit, called the police. Laptop returned, Birkeland arrested, bond posted, and he'll be in court on Monday. Local discussion.

So, what can we learn from this?

1. Put tape over the webcam before you power on the laptop

2. Set Skype so it does not automatically answer incoming calls

3. Turn off Skype

4. Don't start Skype when you startup your computer

5. Don't answer another person's Skype

Posted by Phil Wolff at 10:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

The beginning of the year began very promising concerning the concurrent Skype users online. In a speed record of 42 days we passed from 11 million to 12 million people online at peak time [18 January 2008 - 7 February 2008].

As my regular readers know, there are some fluctuations, resulting in less people online at:

• “GMT”-night
• Weekends
• National holidays of bigger Skype countries (USA, Brasil, UK, …)
• Christmas and New Year Period
• Northern Hemisphere Summer Period

The graph below represents my samples of concurrent people online since the early beginning of Skype, and it seems we are entering in summer recession.

• The points marked 1, 2, 3 and 5 are the Northern Hemisphere summer periods of 2005 till 2008.

• The vertical line “4” represents the huge outage of August last year.

The next “million milestone” will most probably not be reached before September. This is deceptive. Indeed, the promising “start of the year” mentioned above seems to have been a “one shot”.

All the new “features” added by Skype in the last months, including the caller ID number recognition launched some weeks ago were not spectacular enough to attract bunches of new users. This doesn't mean those features were not nice. I would even say the Skype client has improved in the last months: less bugs, more stability, better quality.

Skype continues to grow; of this I am quite sure. But not at the same speed as their best year, 2006, where almost 4 million “peak concurrent users” online were added! Let’s us meet in September again to witness the 13 million milestone.

Jean Mercier, the Skype Numerologist, is on his own family holiday in Brazil.

Posted by Jean Mercier at 09:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Law & Order: Criminal Intent, "Reunion", episode 7.16 (#149), first aired 13 July 2008. "When the host of TV's Rock 'n' Talk is bludgeoned to death by a champagne bottle, Logan and Wheeler's investigation into the seamy music world involves Jordie Black, Wheeler's favorite rock star from high school, whose secret past pushes Wheeler's admiration to the brink." Starring Chris Noth as Detective Mike Logan and Julianne Nicholson as Detective Megan Wheeler.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 08:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Last Friday morning, iPhone 3G launch day, I caught the earliest commuter train into Toronto and arrived at the Rogers "designated" iPhone launch store about 30 minutes before opening at 8 a.m. A lineup of about 150 people (awaiting what turned out to be 100 units with a cap of 2 per customer) who had endured a massive downpour about an hour earlier and been served a "breakfast" of a granola bar and orange juice. Ironically this store occupies the location of what was, at one time, Canada's largest record store (Sam The Record Man) which went out of business a few years ago due to the Internet's impact on music distribution.

During the wait I had the opportunity to interview Jordan Brown, (left) a 16-year-old high school student, who had arrived at 4 p.m. the previous afternoon to be first in line, and Robert Cowley, an auctioneer and Mac fanatic, who joined Jordan 45 minutes later once he saw that a lineup was forming. Jordan had been following the original iPhone activity for the past year but did not join the crowd who went to the U.S. to get an unlocked iPhone. This would be his first Rogers wireless account; he decided to acquire an iPhone as a result of the service plan changes announced by Rogers two days earlier. His reasons for wanting one included the browsing experience and the App store. But at a broader level he was keen to explore all the features. Robert was a long time Mac aficionado who wanted to extend his Mac experience to a mobile device. He had heard rumors about limited supply and high demand so wanted to ensure he acquired one on the launch day. In his case he was going to move the Rogers account for his Blackberry Pearl to the iPhone.

About ten minutes prior to the launch the media were allowed into the store to take up positions prior to the opening. (Blogger credentials helped here.) There were seven agents ready to take orders and Steve Krecklo had been designated to take the first order. Surrounded by at least forty video cameras, Steve patiently waited as the time approached. At the store opening, Jordan arrived and was overwhelmed by the media. He was interviewed live for Canada AM - CTV's national morning show and CITY-TV's Breakfast AM - a "local" station. The most popular question: "whom would he make his first call to?" "My friend who chided me for wanting to wait so long to get an iPhone." An iPhone package appeared; Steve opened it and gave it to Jordan while he set up Jordan's account. As shown to the right above, more media madness ensued!

Finally Jordan was able to make his call -- and got voicemail! Another call got him through to a friend with whom he talked about his experience. Meanwhile Rob was completing his purchase and activation of two iPhones, one to replace his Pearl 8100 and the other for a friend. I actually witnessed the moving of his SIM to the iPhone. Another Rogers rep was taking the time to walk Rob through all the details of his service agreement. In a subsequent interview with Rob (for which a new N95 user interface for Qik.com resulted in not getting Qik.com's video streaming working) he pointed out that (i) he viewed his iPhone as a mobile extension of his Mac and (ii) he would have acquired an iPhone even under the initially proposed Rogers service plans. It was certainly clear that Rob was a Mac fanatic who was well acquainted with its differentiating features. I hope to do a follow up interview with Rob once he has a few days' experience with it.

During all this activity I was reporting the activity via Twitter4Skype using iSkoot on my Blackberry; I also was seeing reports of iBricks when previous iPhone users attempted to upgrade to the iPhone 2.0 software.

At that point it was time to move onto my next appointment. Outside, more media were interviewing Jordan after he left the store. There was still a lineup of about 75 being entertained by Rogers personnel handing out Rogers umbrellas (yes, it was raining again) and Rogers "I was at the launch" T-shirts. But, as later reported:

• This location only had 100 iPhones (80 8GB, 20 16GB) and was soon sold out. The following morning I visited my local Rogers Plus store which had only received 13 units that were sold out in the first hour (and left a line-up of potential customers disappointed). They had no indication of when they would be restocked (other than maybe on their normal Thursday restocking day).
• There were no reports of "rain checks" for those who had persevered under not the best weather conditions.
• Rogers had eventually encountered the worldwide activation problems reported elsewhere.

My Facebook Photo Album for this event with more details.

Tom Cross: iHate my iPhone because it's iDead. Hat tip to Andy who also reports that Bastille Day celebrations possibly delay the iPhone launch in France.

Mark Evans: "Any Day Now".

To follow: Learnings from the Canadian iPhone 3G Launch.

Tags: iPhone 3G, Rogers, Jordan Brown, Robert Cowley

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 06:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Over the past few months, both my older son and I have broken the belt clip that comes with the standard Blackberry 88xx case; a friend has broken the same clip four times since acquiring a 8830 last winter; my younger son dropped his 8100 about four or five feet such that the keyboard became non-functional. I also was having problems with the case occasionally falling off my belt (and made sure to remove my Blackberry from my belt whenever there was a chance it could accidentally fall into water).

At CES last January I attended the Showcase event on the Monday evening and came across the OtterBox booth where they were handing out the OtterBox 1000 waterproof cases, representative of the design considerations OtterBox takes into account in all their products. I also signed up for their monthly email newsletter. From their website:

Our cases are dedicated to all the klutzy, spontaneous, chaotic, graceless individuals who have broken a device or valuable due to their active lifestyle. Like our customers, we've been there too! From the beginning, we have protected valuables through innovation. This “innovative spirit” has allowed evolution in our product lines to safeguard the hottest technologies such as iPod's, smartphones, PDA's, Tablet PC's, laptops and other devices. We take the idea of a protective case to the next level so customers can find the ideal solution for any work environment or adventure!

A month ago I received one of their monthly emails, which recalled all the recent adventures described above. So I made an enquiry to see where they were sold in Canada and, given the issues I had run encountered as described above and my presence on Skype Journal, my contact offered to send me an evaluation Defender case for my Blackberry 8820.

The complete package comprises three layers that enclose the Blackberry: a clear plastic film which is "wrapped" around the Blackberry, a ruggedized plastic shell (with appropriate openings) and a silicon (rubber-like) outer case. In addition it includes a molded belt clip which is designed to wrap around any standard width belt. (Sorry ... no ultra-wide cowboy belts!) The OtterBox-enclosed Blackberry slides quite securely into the belt clip, held by a unique molded plastic "interlocking" pattern within each component (see image below). The Blackberry's "auto keyboard lock" feature is sensitive to the insertion of the Blackberry into the belt clip. OtterBox claims they protect against moisture (it's not waterproof, however), bumps, drops and scratches. They have really thought through all the aspects of operating your Blackberry in a normal, uninhibited manner.

I have now used the OtterBox for over three weeks, including under conditions that would have caused my original Blackberry belt clip to break. Most importantly I can certainly confirm their statement: "All functions of the phone remain fully usable through the case, and all ports are accessible through convenient Silicone plugs." Even the trackball is dealt with in a manner such that it loses none of its critical sensitivity. There is no difference in keystroke action on the keyboard and those side buttons, such as volume control, work perfectly fine. The only issue I encountered was smoothing out the initial plastic film that wraps around the Blackberry prior to inserting it into its shell. Basically your objective is to minimize or eliminate bubbles over the display. At my OtterBox contact's suggestion I found it was best to clean the inner side of the film with eyeglass cleaner and then rub the palm of my hand such that a very thin film of oil from my hand was left on the inside of the film; then scrape a plastic (credit) card over the display. Whatever was left of any bubbles was not noticeable when the screen was active and on.

Final confirmation: I just bought an OtterBox for the 8110/8120/8130 for my younger son's birthday to use on the 8110 Pearl he acquired to replace his broken 8100. And I have recommended it to my older son and the friend who broke four belt clips in four months.

Otterbox also provides cases for iPhone, Palm, HP and Symbol PDA's and smartphones. They also provide waterproof cases for digital cameras, MP3 players and other small items.

And there was no problem using iSkoot on my Otter-encased Blackberry while riding commuter trains to/from the Canadian iPhone launch yesterday. By the time I got home I had learned about all the iBrick issues via Twitter4Skype.

Tags: OtterBox, Blackberry, PDA case, protective case

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 02:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Guest post by Glenn C. in New Jersey, United States

On the strength of the glowing review on YOUR web site [HotRecorder - Record Skype Calls, by Stuart Henshall on March 25, 2005] I bought HotRecorder to record Skype calls.

"HotRecorder for VoIP
Flawlessly record your VoIP conversations"
"Works with Skype 3.0"
from the HotRecorder.com web site

What a mistake.  It does not work.

I am an experienced computer user. After installing this software, it did not do any of the basic functions it was supposed to do. I am running Skype, the latest version. I downloaded it the day I purchased HotRecorder, 23 June 2008. I installed the software and entered the software key, and restarted.

There was an important conference call I needed to record. It was one hour in length. After recording (which I started, per HotRecorder instructions, after the connection was established) the software read that 240 minutes had been recorded. But it was only 60.

Then when I started to play it back, first it took about 10 minutes before the software showed the name of the recording session in the window. Then I selected it to play and it played back at a very, very slow speed when compared to normal speech, and the audio is extremely low and unintelligible, and is punctuated by buzzes.

I am running an HP Pavilion dv1340US with 1 GB RAM and plenty of disk space. There is nothing unusual about the computer at all. It is running Windows XP professional. I configured HotRecorder for the high quality recording option.

Bottom line is this software did not deliver the basic function I bought it for. Despite multiple emails to the HotRecorder support email address, and an inquiry through PayPal, I have received no response.

I requested a refund.

I tried to dispute the $14.95 charge through PayPal.  PayPal rejected my dispute because I had actually received the software.  Apparently PayPal will not consider disputes in which the quality or functionality of the product is questioned. 

I should have used a credit card through PayPal so that I would have had another level of protection against product problems. When you attempt to use a credit card, PayPal flashes you a screen that basically says it's just as safe and you're just as protected using your PayPal balance or checking account, but now I realize that is not the case.

Posted by Guest Blogger at 03:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (7) | TrackBacks (0)

Or maybe this should be called: Neither Steve Jobs nor Jim Balsille Will Tolerate Even the Contemplation of Failure.

Last week I reported on Rogers' announcement of new data plans for both the forthcoming iPhone (available in two days) and RIM's Blackberry. In fact, I had immediately changed my Blackberry plan to a new one where the price per MB had gone down by 96%.

But the blogger and Internet response to the announcements re the iPhone turned into a huge PR fiasco for Rogers. Almost 60,000 signed an online petition; reaction on the Internet through blog posts and comments demonstrated that Apple has a huge fan base that wants to remain loyal to Apple but would not tolerate being overcharged. Rumors had Apple diverting Canadian-designated iPhone shipments to other countries in response to Rogers' pricing. The story garnered five minute bytes on evening national newscasts on all three Canadian television networks. Comparisons with AT&T and T-Mobile plans demonstrated that either Rogers did not have sufficient infrastructure, including backhaul, to support unlimited data plans or they were simply overcharging due to their GSM monopoly situation in Canada. It became an international story with CNN amongst others covering it.

Mark Evans and I (see link above) both predicted these plans would not garner the sales volumes that Apple was expecting.

Today Rogers announced that, until August 30, any smartphone, including Blackberries on BIS, on the 3G network will be able to get a $30 per month data plan covering 6GB of data until August 31. As predicted last fall, I knew the RIM people had to be onto Rogers as soon as they announced this plan for the iPhone. Now Rogers has to address the inequity of the situation where Blackberries on BES (read "corporate accounts") are still being charged $60 for 25MB. (When I started this post, the new data plan was only for the iPhone. Talk about "Breaking News".)

Thanks to the leadership of Steve Jobs at Apple  and Jim Balsille at RIM, along with the very passionate Canadian Apple and Blackberry fan base, for demonstrating that it is possible for the smartphone vendors to call the shots. Even in monopoly situations, carriers have limits as to how much the public will tolerate the abuse of a public trust -- in this case licenses for wireless communications. Obviously ARPU went out the door in favor of customer recruitment. (Were bonus plans renegotiated at Rogers?) Let's see if the same happens in Mexico and New Zealand where again, there are some very exorbitant plans offered for the iPhone.

And, in closing, let the real Canadian Smartphone Games begin!

Reaction at Crackberry.com; Rogers initial press release today

Mark Evans: Who at Rogers Blew the iPhone includes a comparative chart of iPhone plans by country (although the Canada column is now out-of-date).

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Luca Filigheddu blogs Eric Eldon's VentureBeat story that confirms BT, the British telecom giant, is in talks to buy Ribbit, one of the best talk 2.0 services on Earth. Ribbit spokespeople can't confirm or deny. Parsing...

Ribbit gives programmers free tools to build their own Skypes. Behind the user interface toolkit is a communications platform. Ribbit handles all the messy plumbing of connecting people to each other over many different types of networks, including Skype and PSTN, for a small fee. You can build a flash IM/voice/video client in a few hours (or less) using existing widgets.

Ribbit is the best platform available to talk-enable the web. There are thousands of user interfaces needed, and only a web services software platform lets designers and programmers tailor talk tools to their contexts. 

For example, their Salesforce application enables mobile calls and voice memos within Salesforce web applications. Without anyone having to join a network, download a 20MB software client, or configure anything. Contrast that with Skype for Salesforce which, while better integrated into Salesforce's CTI framework, requires callers to use Skype, and call center operators to have SkypeOut accounts.

Google bought similar plumbing, if not a platform, when it picked up GrandCentral this time last year.

BT is getting a Silicon Valley presence; a large, growing, excited developer program; and a bizdev engine that can drive Internet alliances.

Skype could have entered this space (and Skype Journal begged for this). Between legacy software architecture and Meg Whitman's golden handcuffs, Skype's execs never brought a web service infrastructure to market. Is it too late for Skype to bid for the company? $55 million seems to be the market price. 

Here's video of Ribbit's Crick Waters speaking earlier this year at the Emerging Communications Conference. And his slides:

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Posted by Phil Wolff at 05:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted by Phil Wolff at 09:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Since 1996 I have been involved in buying Dell laptops and desktop PC's, not only for my own use but also helping friends and non-profits acquire PC's for their personal and business needs. A constant throughout most of that period was that each of these PC's came with a digital media offering called Musicmatch. Not only an audio player, Musicmatch's client could also "rip" CD's and assist in managing your media library. In fact, I even bought a couple of upgrades to their premium service over the years. MusicMatch, Inc. was led by current SightSpeed CEO Peter Csathy. From his SightSpeed bio:

Csathy previously served as president and COO of Musicmatch, Inc., where he was responsible for driving the company's distribution and content strategies, managing strategic partnerships, and overseeing the company's business development, sales, legal and finance activities. Yahoo! acquired Musicmatch in 2004.

Aside from selling Musicmatch into what has become the Yahoo black hole of services at an opportune time when Apple's iPod and iTunes offerings were resetting the business model for music acquisition and playing, Peter developed a network of contacts, business relationship experience and trust at Dell such that coming back to Dell for a SightSpeed partnership with Dell Video Chat was probably "a natural" on both Dell's and SightSpeed's part. Getting technology to market is not simply about the technology; it's about developing trusted business partnerships and executing across the network. Terms and Conditions of this new agreement probably reflect on their previous business experience as much as on the boiler plate lawyers wanted to include. CxO's are hired not only for their management experience but also for the network of contacts they can bring to the table.

While Phil makes some excellent points about why SightSpeed was able to complete a deal with Dell, I think the overriding factor in SightSpeed's new Dell partnership is more a result of previous network contacts accompanied by business relationship experience in building a service as opposed to Skype simply "losing" a deal. The challenge for SightSpeed is now to build additional partnerships with other vendors and social networking offerings beyond these legacy relationships. The good news for end users is that there are two different conversation infrastructure offerings out there that can only build consumer awareness of what can be done to bring new real time conversation user experiences when incorporated into consumer businesses with extensive user bases.

Over at Skype we're starting to see the evolution of Skype as a true business built on the foundation of Skype's conversation infrastructure software. It's not a case of just starting with Josh Silverman's appointment as CEO but his building an experienced CxO management team that can make the operation run smoothly and avoid fiasco's such as the loss of "0207" numbers in London last fall. Expect to see a seasoned CMO, as effectively called for in my Primer series posts last fall, and, with the complex mix of technology now embedded in Skype as its most critical asset, a CTO at some point in the near future. This is not based on any information from within Skype; it's the natural evolution of a maturing company now being led by a business savvy Stanford MBA CEO and a Harvard MBA COO who has taken on a much wider range of challenges and experiences in his life than your average CxO.

Ironically, as a prior relationship revealed in Howard Wolinsky's interview with recently appointed Skype COO Scott Durschlag posted yesterday, it will be interesting to see whether Scott's previous business relationship at Motorola with Ron Garriques -- now President of Dell's Global Consumer Group -- will result in any innovative new initiatives between Skype and Dell in the future. More importantly for Skype, however, would be the wireless carrier relationships Scott had to build in helping to make the Motoroal RAZR the success that it was.

It's the mix of leadership, management experience, marketing programs, business networks and technology assets, combined with passionate employee teams, that will make both Skype and SightSpeed winners in their respective business and market spheres.

Tags: SightSpeed, Peter Csathy, Skype, Josh Silverman, Scott Durschlag

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 04:46 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

SightSpeed's Berkeley, California headquarters

Skype earned their way to two Dell gaming laptops in May 2006, the XPS M2010 and the XPS M1210. Back when this was all novel, Skype had an inside track. And now small and nimble SightSpeed secured a bigger presence with the world's largest PC company. Congrats, SightSpeed!

Why did Skype lose and SightSpeed win?

Speculating:

Since Then...

• Relationship turnover. The normal musical chairs of both Dell and Skype personnel.

• Stale memories. Evidence from 2006 may not have been persuasive in 2008.

• Unmemorable results. The earlier test was stacked against Skype: customers had to opt-in. Would having Skype on a US laptop in 2006 have improved sales?

And Now...

• SightSpeed skinned well. When Dell calls, you jump. Could Skype have offered Dell a "powered by" client in Spring 2008? A Dell version of Skype's web site? No.

• More video now. SightSpeed offers multi-party video conferencing; Skype offers more telecom, audio conferencing, quality depending on conditions outside Skype's/Dell's control. In which did Dell want to co-brand?

• Customer Primacy. SightSpeed gave Dell the primary customer relationship. If Dell swaps out to another video supplier, would SightSpeed be more likely than Skype to help Dell transition customers to the new provider?

• Revenue Sharing. Money doesn't always change hands in these types of deals, but it's not been done. Skype could offer a piece of its service subscription pie. Dell would have more power in a relationship with tiny SightSpeed and might extract/extort more cash with better auditability.

Five things Skype can do beyond normal business practices:

1. Tune the desktop client for skinning.
   
   Skype customized for partners before. TOM Online to serve the Chinese market and comply with PRC censorship laws, and MySpace IM with Skype to add identity and voice interoperability. In both cases, engineering costs were non-trivial and ongoing.
   
   4b (the Skype for Windows 4 Beta) will help. It's UI framework is made to be easily reconfigured and tweaked by Skype developers.
   
   Companies like Dell will value the ability to tailor user experiences across each of their demographics. They design PC packages to fit user task profiles - which activities people spend the most time on, what is most important - for office collaboration, team gameplay, family ties, hypersocial tweens, hardened security devices. Skype must make it fast and easy for partners like Dell to reshape Skype for each product family.

2. Open the client UI. Race to see how fast you can open the UI to independent developers, for skinning and plug-in applications. When you get it right, you'll

3. Multiparty Video. Keeping up with the SightSpeeds. And Apples.

4. Continuity of Scale. Adding the Nth person to a conference should seamlessly move the call to a platform better able to support that conference. It could be a member of the conference with more capacity or better bandwidth. It could be a conferencing service like Vapps' HighDef or Skype's Skypecasts. Remove the friction.

5. Serve a web client. Talk is not just for your buddy list anymore. It's for friends in Dell forums, Dell support, Dell blogs, Dell investor relations, Dell government affairs. Offer the world's Dells a platform they can use, not just sell.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 06:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Some of our chatter is about talk, especially coordinating future conversations. 

We use various communication channels to negotiate coordinates in time and cyberspace.

We "ping", "poke", direct message our @friends in the channels they are most likely to notice, the better to trigger attention. We propose the channels and modes offering the best mix of commonality (we all have access) and fit (it's right for our type of conversation).

If we're lucky, we catch the right people before the topic or our interest expires. Some time windows are near. 

Other events may be further away, needing reminders or quorums.

Sometimes we invite the universe to join. 

So, a few questions.

1.

When is this sort of metatalk best done informally, in back and forth twits, IMs, texts, personal emails?

And when is more structured negotiation a better fit? Many services are built to support this particular conversation. The likes of Anyvite, Evite, Socializr, MyPunchBowl, MadeIt, Phonevite, Mobaganda, Pingg, Presdo, Amiando, Invitastic, MadeIt, iPartee, Renkoo, ImThere, Skobee, Zoji, Windows Live Events, Google Calendar, Rondee, When Is Good, Scheduly, Jiffle, TimeBridge take some of the effort out, especially when you have many people or many talks to support.

2.

How important is it to tailor your metatalk to the channels people prefer? Angela always checks her email all day, Frank follows FriendFeed, and Tim lives with his iPhone. Tailoring cuts average time-to-confirmation and increases the chance of confirmations-per-proposed event.

3.

Do you want your future conversations visible inside Skype? Not a "history" tab but a "future" tab? Full of tentative, proposed, and scheduled talks and meetings? A place to watch and propose and wrangle upcoming conversations?

Posted by Phil Wolff at 09:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Posted by Phil Wolff at 09:33 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

"572,907 businesses in 302 countries by 507,715 people" in the SkypeFind directory today. Results for "pizza": 183 in the UK, 1044 in the US, 283 in Italy.

Skype's business directory search is prominent in the new Skype for Windows 4 Beta. Adjacency to people search will put the directory in front of millions more users.

Skype partners with Ingenio, purchased by AT&T in 2007. Ingenio sells and serves click-to-call ads on Skype Find. Ingenio powers English language click-to-call programs for AOL, Microsoft, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service, SMARTpages.com and other business directories.

You can sometimes see ads in US listings in the upper right side of search results.

When you click on "Advertise here" you arrive at Skype.Ingenio.com.

The model is simple. Make your ad, Ingenio runs it on SkypeFind and other directories, you pay Ingenio when people call you, Skype gets a piece of your ad budget.

Challenges ahead:

1. Relevance. Ads on topic are good for Skype customer satisfaction. Relevance is easy for the rare well-tagged listing, much harder for most user generated listings.

2. Global coverage. Many phone cultures, different languages, multiple payment systems. Skype needs Ingenios for all major markets.

3. Privacy. Searches include country, maybe city or state. For more nuanced geotargeting - promised by Ingenio - I'm sure they use IP address location mapping. Skype must work out how divulging user IP addresses fits into Skype's treasured privacy policies.

P.S. Wishlist: One of Ingenio's best features is managing when and how calls come to you. Only run ads during office hours. Cut off ads when you stop taking delivery pizza orders. Route weekend callers to voice mail. Pause ads when you on a business trip. These features should be built into Skype for all users. eBay sellers especially will thank you.

P.P.S. SkypeFind's browserly user interface in Skype for Windows 3.X was a preview of Skype 4B.

See also:

• The PrimeSkype Commerce Community
• Skype Developer Program in Flux III: Going Forward
• A Primer for Skype's Direction: Enabling Real Time Conversations
• Skype "Unified Directory" web service APIs slated for Q1-2008 release
• If Google pays me to find local businesses, should Skype?
• Why I don't put stuff in SkypeFind and how I would fix it
• SkypeFind growing naturally
• Is Skype Innovating Faster?
• Contactivity: A design goal
• Dear Skype: A letter of concern from a Developer about SkypeFind and the Skype ecosystem
• Sten Tamkivi on SkypeFind rollout
• SkypeFind Flower Power
• Skype takes on Google, Microsoft and Yahoo in local business listings with new "SkypeFind" - and ratings/reviews

Skype-Ingenio FAQ below the fold... 

From the Skype-Ingenio FAQ as of 5 July 2008:

Q:  What's the relationship between Ingenio and Skype?

A:  Ingenio and Skype have teamed up to create a new and exciting way for you to promote your business online. The joint effort allows you to reach the growing number of Skype users who are conducting searches on SkypeFind in the United States for local businesses and information. As a Pay Per Call advertiser, you will also be able to gain access to quality leads by having your ads not just on SkypeFind but also run across the rest of the Ingenio Pay Per Call advertising network comprised of leading search engines, Internet yellow page directories, mobile search, and free directory assistance service providers.

Q:  What is SkypeFind?

A:  SkypeFind is a community-edited collection of businesses which allows Skype users to recommend and promote them to the entire Skype community. You can also find and call the ones other Skype users use and recommend. SkypeFind relies on the Skype community to add and maintain business listings. Each business that is listed has been entered, reviewed, and edited by other Skype users, making them more relevant for community members.

Q:  What is Ingenio Pay Per Call?

A:  Ingenio Pay Per Call allows you to purchase live customer phone calls generated through Ingenio's advertising network, which includes SkypeFind. You don't even need a website to participate because Pay Per Call ads deliver ready-to-buy consumers directly to your phone.

Q:  How does Pay Per Call differ from click-based advertising?

A:  Unlike click-based advertising, Pay Per Call uses a phone call as the means by which you interact with a prospect, rather than a click. This means, as a Pay Per Call advertiser, you pay only when your Pay Per Call ad generates a call to your business, whereas click-based advertisers pay for clicks to their website, which do not always result in a phone lead. Using a phone call as the billable event, allows the majority of businesses to participate whether or not they have a website and is the most natural way to connect with a consumer when they are searching in SkypeFind.

Q:  How can Pay Per Call help grow my business?

A:  Pay Per Call allows you to generate phone leads to your business from the growing numbers of customers who are searching for businesses and information online. On a more practical level, Pay Per Call enables consumers to find your business via ads that appear in search results listed on major search engines, directories and SkypeFind. As a Pay Per Call advertiser, consumers contact you at the phone number and times that you specify, which helps insure that each potential customer is speaking to the right person at the right time.

Q:  How does Pay Per Call work?

A:  Pay Per Call works similarly to click-based advertising, except that it drives phone leads to your business, rather than clicks to a website. You can sign up as an advertiser and create an ad in five easy steps:

1. Create a simple text ad
2. Select your geographic service areas and business categories
3. Set your phone call lead price using a bid for placement system that helps determine how high in the search results your ad will appear
4. Select a payment plan and provide payment information
5. Set-up a custom schedule that automatically displays your ad only during your business hours

Pay Per Call ads appear in search results when Skype users conduct a search query for business information on SkypeFind. When your business ads appears in search results, consumers can reach your company via a toll-free number provided by Ingenio. These toll-free phone numbers forward calls directly to your business number as well as track calls for billing and reporting purposes. For prominent placement in search results, you set a maximum price that you are willing to pay for a call from a potential customer.

Q:  Where will my Pay Per Call ads appear?

A:  Once you create your ad with Ingenio it will be displayed in search results across the entire Pay Per Call Ad advertising network, which includes Web and mobile search, online directories such as SkypeFind, free directory assistance services and podcast providers:

• Online Search and Yellow Pages (aol, local.com, infopace, local matters, marchex, switchboard, dex, magicyellow)
• Mobile Search (msn mobile, aol mobile, mapquest, jumptap)
• Directory Assistance (1800free411, 1-800-sandiego, 1-800-411-save)
  

Q:  How much does it cost to use Pay Per Call?

A:  Accessing Pay Per Call ads from search results is free for consumers to use. As a Pay Per Call advertiser, the fee for each call received from your Ingenio Pay Per Call ad is based on the Max Price Per Call you set. With Ingenio's Auto-Bidding you are only charged $0.01 more than the next highest competitor's Max Price Per Call at the time of the call. You are never charged more than your Max Price Per Call. You also have the option to select a monthly budget*, which puts a limit on your monthly advertising spending. If your Pay Per Call fees reach your monthly budget, your Pay Per Call ad(s) will be paused until the following calendar month.

* The minimum monthly budget is $5,000 per month for invoice customers.

Q:  When do I get charged for a call?

A:  To ensure you get maximum value as a Pay Per Call advertiser, you are not charged in the following situations:

• Follow-up calls: Only the first call from a phone number will be charged within a 3-day period.
• Short calls: Since most short calls do not lead to a sale you will not be charged.
• Hang-ups & unanswered calls: You will not be charged until sufficient time for the phone to be picked up elapses.
• User paused: You will not be charged if you receive a call when your ad is paused.

Other new phone call leads delivered to your ring-to number will be charged, so be ready to receive calls when your ad is live and use scheduling to automatically pause your ad when you are unavailable.

Q:  How can I increase the number of calls I receive?

A:  To improve the effectiveness of your ad consider the following:

• Edit your Business Name and Marketing Message to clarify your offering, and make sure they are relevant to the business categories you've selected. See our tips for success.
• Enhance your business profile by adding business details, your logo and a coupon or adjusting your callable hours to fit your schedule.
• Select a different business category. If you don't see a category that accurately describes your business, you can suggest a new category.
  

Q:  Which phone number should I use as my ring-to number for my Pay Per Call ad?

A:  We suggest you use your business phone as your ring-to number. If you choose to use your cell phone number (as opposed to a traditional land-line) and you know you'll be out of calling range, be sure to pause your Pay Per Call ad so that you don't miss valuable phone call leads.
*Please note there are instances when cell phones don't ring even when in the coverage area. These calls generally go to voicemail and are charged as Pay Per Call leads.

Q:  How can I manage when I receive calls?

A:  You have ultimate control over when you receive calls from your Pay Per Call ads, because you can:

• Set up a custom schedule that will automatically display your ad only during your business hours.
• Manually override your schedule to display ads on days you want to take calls outside of your schedule.
• Manually pause ads when your business closes for an extended period of time, until you are ready to receive calls again.
  

Q:  How do I select the best categories for my business?

A:  To get the most highly-qualified customers calling, you should select the categories that best represent your business. By doing so, Ingenio will ensure your ad will be presented to ready-to-buy customers who are searching specifically for a business like yours. You can select up to five categories where your Pay Per Call ad will be displayed.

Q:  What is the best payment plan for my business?

A:  Most advertisers prefer the Auto-Deposit payment plan, because of its convenience and flexibility. Auto-Deposit ensures your ad stays active by replenishing your account whenever your balance goes below the Max Price Per Call you've set.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 07:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Last week Dell launched its new Studio line of laptops. According to Mobile Review (17") and PC Mag (15") -- both of which gave them an "Editor's Choice" designation, this line is a cross of the Inspiron consumer line's pricing and the XPS laptops' reputation for having "desktop" horsepower. Apparently the ability to make a fashion statement in selection of the color scheme is also a key feature. And it includes a 2 megapixel built-in webcam.

We are also at a stage where the consumer community is starting to grow awareness of real time video communications. The Mac's iChat feature has been instrumental in introducing a new generation to video calling. But video requires more PC horsepower (processor speeds, better audio and video device management), improved webcam technology (such as the Logitech Carl-Zeiss optics webcams), more effective user interfaces and high quality broadband (at a minimum) Internet connections. We have witnessed the expansion of Skype's video calling to the point where apparently 28% of all Skype-to-Skype minutes now include video as a component of the conversation. Certainly Skype's High Quality Video has changed me from a lethargic occasional user of video calling to one who uses it for most of my Skype calls.

As noted in the Dell press release, the launch of Dell's Studio line is accompanied by the introduction of  Dell Video Chat, powered by SightSpeed, a pioneer, since the "last" Comdex in 2002, in providing the infrastructure for real time video conversations. I have been a follower of their evolution since that launch and watched as they established a market niche for video messaging and SightSpeed for Business (initially allowing 4-way multi-party video conversations but recently enhanced to support 9-way multi-party video conversations). Dell Video Chat for Dell Studio laptop owners includes not only the basic free features associated with SightSpeed but also the 4-way multi-party video chat, unlimited video storage and other features of SightSpeed's Plus service. SightSpeed's press release lists all the features.

While Dell Video Chat presents to the user a redesigned, more user-friendly user interface, incorporating feedback from SightSpeed users, the underlying infrastructure is basically that available with SightSpeed; however, a few key features of note:

• The new user interface has separate tabs readily leading to video, voice and text chat conversations.
• 4-way multi-party video chat sessions is Dell Video Chat's and SightSpeed's most significant differentiating feature. Multi-party conversations can be launched and expanded from within a video chat session without the need to restart a call.
• It incorporates the ability to send video mail messages when a contact is not available, a long time unique feature of SightSpeed's service.
• SightSpeed recently upgraded its service to provide improved handling of, and adjustment to, users' Internet network connection conditions.
• It incorporates free VoIP-based calling to other Dell Video Chat contacts; calls can be made to the PSTN at the usual low rates of most VoIP services with this offering (with the exception of calls to mobile numbers outside North America).
• There is a "Video Privacy" button that allows you to turn on/off transmission of your video images.

In order that friends and colleagues who do not have a Dell Studio laptop can communicate with Dell Studio owners using Dell Video Chat, a Dell Video Chat client is also available for download and installation on both Windows and Mac platforms. It works with most webcams; however, for the best video experience I have to recommend the Logitech QuickCam Pro webcams with Carl-Zeiss optics; this was confirmed in a couple of SightSpeed test calls with Andy Abramson at VoIP Watch.. These users obtain the free basic SightSpeed features but must upgrade to the Plus service to obtain services such as hosting 4-way video calls¹, extended video mail recording and unlimited storage.

Some observations, incorporating comments from an interview with SightSpeed CEO Peter Csathy:

• Dell Video Chat is most obviously Dell's response to the popularity of the Mac's iChat service.
• Dell Video Chat will primarily build a user based as new Dell Studio PC's are acquired; currently my contact list is very limited (to SightSpeed personnel and affiliates). Apparently we can expect to see Dell Video Chat coming with other Dell laptops and Dell desktops in the future. Building a user base will be SightSpeed's and Dell's major challenge in a world with users already subscribed to any of iChat, MSN Live Messenger, Yahoo Messenger and, of course, Skype.
• The new Dell Video Chat interface is not only a more pleasing skin; it provides an improved user experience relative to the SightSpeed client.
• Through Dell as a partner channel SightSpeed will certainly build awareness of real time video conversations as a low cost communications tool.
• The Dell Video Chat relationship is an initial partner in SightSpeed's goal to provide real time video calling infrastructure services to other platforms and possibly social media networks.
• Anne at Dell's Your Blog says, So Easy Your Mom Can Do It.

And a few comments:

• With Firefox approaching a 20% market share it would be nice if the web links from SightSpeed's clients would recognize the user's default browser settings instead of forcing Internet Explorer to open.
• Currently SightSpeed's technology requires 1.5 MHz Internet upload connections speed to transmit 640 x 480 VGA video at 30 frames per second, well above the <1Mbps speed available with widely deployed consumer (cable and DSL) broadband services. As result broadband users can only expect to see 320 x 240 resolution. While providing a more than acceptable video call quality for video conversations, this resolution does not have the psychological impact of 640 x 480 @ 30 fps found with Skype's High Quality Video over consumer broadband connections.
• Audio quality: While the Dell Studio laptops are equipped with array microphone and speaker hardware that take care of echo cancellation, using SightSpeed from other platforms appears to require headsets to take care of potential echo cancellation issues. Most of my Skype conversations, incorporating Skype's inherent echo cancellation feature, are with users on both Mac and Windows PC's who find they can converse quite satisfactorily using their PC's inherent mic and speakers. My only use of a headset is when there are privacy issues or I don't want to disturb nearby colleagues. And, to date, I have not experienced on SightSpeed-to-SightSpeed conversations the quality of Skype's HD Voice with its wide audio bandwidth on Skype-to-Skype conversations .

The IP communications space thrives on both innovation and competition. SightSpeed has, since my initial experience several years ago, been a leader in real time video communications. There is still a huge learning curve out there for the consumer public to become familiar with the concept of low cost IP-based communications, especially real time video calling. The SightSpeed team is passionately committed to providing high quality services; when encountering some initial problems with running the latest SightSpeed upgrade and Dell Video Chat, they immediately addressed the issues (and have probably made some unannounced service modifications). Dell Video Chat will provide a much broader public with an IP-based video communications experience, much as the Mac has introduced video, text and voice communications through its iChat service. Finding market niches such as video messaging, SightSpeed for Business and infrastructure services such as Dell Video Chat are building for SightSpeed a business that has both the potential for profitability as well as a being a more than competent player in the IP-based communications space.

As for selecting a service it's up to you as an end user to determine which services both meet your needs and are most easily implemented and operated. Dell Video Chat and SightSpeed are definitely worth a try for the user experience.

For more information about SightSpeed listen to Squawk Box's recent interview with SightSpeed COO Scott Lomond.

SightSpeed CEO Peter Csathy's blog: Digital Media Update

Previous Posts:

• The "No Hardwadre" Movement Continues: SIghtSpeed Offers Video Communications Services for Business
• Video Here, Video There, Video Everywhere
• To Each Its Own; There's Personal Video and Then There's Personal Video
• SightSpeed: Focusing on Personal Video Services

¹Only the host of a multi-party video chat session needs to be a subscriber to the SightSpeed Plus service or its Dell Video Chat equivalent; other participants in the call simply need the Dell Video Chat client.

Tags: SightSpeed, Dell Video Chat, Dell Studio, SightSpeed for Business, video messaging, iChat, Skype High Quality Video, Skype, Peter Csathy

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 06:06 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

About two weeks ago Skype launched a new, yet older, type of beta ... one that actually will end at some point in the reasonably near future but that is also a major effort to incorporate user feedback while trialing some new concepts. As mentioned in my previous posts about this beta, this is not a replacement for your current Skype 3.8 or earlier installation in mission critical situations but rather Skype wants to trial this version with a broader audience than simply their very dedicated set of designated outside beta testers worldwide.

On Monday Skype's Product Manager for Windows, Mike Bartlett put out a post, 10 days later ..., commenting on the first ten days of feedback from users. (I'm a little late on following up on this as I'm supposed to be on vacation this week.) To quote Mike:

We've had some very positive feedback from a lot of people on the new way of working, and that's encouraging as it seems we're starting to solve the problems that we set out to solve. However, it's very understandable some of you used to using Skype on a regular basis have been a bit frustrated about not being able to work with Skype the way they are used to.

Key points:

1. In beta 2 they will introduce a "Compact" mode where users can access their main Skype activity through a a more traditionally sized window that does not take a large portion of the user's desktop. From my own experience I like the ability to detach conversations into separate windows, if desired; however, the right side "pane" left over when there is no focus on a Conversation, is wasted desktop space. Perhaps a sliding window pane addition, much like the one that comes with the JWire Hotspot Finder, would be more appropriate. In this case when you focus on a Conversation listed under the Conversations tab but not already open in a detached window or initiate a new conversation with a Contact , the wider conversation pane would slide out and become detachable, if desired. And using this feature should be a user selected option. On the other hand I find the new Conversations tab feature in the left pane to be very useful (a concept apparently adopted from the current Skype for Mac) for readily accessing my conversations with individual contacts..
2. One of the primary issues Skype wants to address is how the video is displayed in a more user friendly, more obvious, yet flexible manner. Basically Mike describes ways to both detach and resize the video in the current beta but also mentions we can expect further enhancements in beta 2. From my own personal experience, Skype video looks best in a minimum 640 x 480 window (available with Skype 3.6 and later) due to its clarity and video quality but with Skype 4.0 beta, as a user, you can determine your own optimum video window size and detach a video session into a separate resizable video window.
3. And for all those frustrated Skype for Mac users out there, expect something later this summer that incorporates feedback from the Skype for Windows beta experience.

One question: does the appearance of the "Add people" button in the detached video window (see Mike's post) foretell a future beta that incorporates multi-party video?

Yes, there are still many "details" being suggested; I'm sure Mike's team is looking at them all and especially looking for commonality amongst the many users providing feedback. We have to give credit to Mike and his team for introducing as a trial such a radical UI change to try out with the wider user community. If nothing else, it has demonstrated the passion and enthusiasm of the Skype user community while providing an opportunity for receiving back their input.

As I have said repeatedly, this is a beta; it's not for any of your mission critical Skype installations as it still lacks some features of the released Skype 3.8. But it's certainly worthwhile installing it on a secondary PC, trying out the various features available and providing feedback.

Once again, this is a beta -- it's not the final released version -- changes, incorporating where feasible and practical the consensus of Skype's user base, will happen. On the other hand, as one who has administered software beta programs in the past when "beta" meant truly trying new concepts while getting user feedback over a limited time period, Skype is running a true beta program for Skype 4.0, not an "infinite" beta as seems to have become the norm for many web services providers these days. Apparently we can expect a second beta release towards the end of the summer, with the objective of a final release later this fall.

Hat tip to Andy at VoIP Watch, who is also supposed to be on vacation this week, for pointing out Mike's post.

Tags: Skype, Skype 4.0 beta, Mike Bartlett

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Posted by Jim Courtney at 04:40 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

About Scott Durchslag:

• Studied with the Dalai Lama

• Recently out of Motorola's mobile devices business

• Scaled Mount Everest

• Traveled through war-torn Yugoslavia as a freelance journalist

• International experience in Asia for McKinsey & Co. (India, Kuala Lumpur, Greater China / Taiwan)

• Worked in refugee camps on the border of Ethiopia and Somalia

Skype news release and Motorola bio below the fold...

Skype Appoints New Chief Operating Officer

Luxembourg, July 1, 2008 - Skype today announced that it has named Scott Durchslag Chief Operating Officer. Scott brings 20 years of experience from Fortune 100 technology corporations, start-ups, and professional services to this newly created role. His post is effective immediately and he will report to Josh Silverman, Skype's president, who was recently appointed to the role March 24, 2008.

Scott was previously with Motorola where he spent 5 years on the top management team of the $25B Mobile Devices Business. Most recently, he was Corporate Vice-President of Global Product & Experience Invention, where he led product strategy, innovation, intellectual property, design, user interfaces, consumer experiences (music, video, imaging, productivity and mobile internet), partnerships, product marketing, and customer care. Previously, Scott was General Manager of South Asia where he built the region with the highest margins. He joined Motorola in 2002 as Chief Strategy Officer of the Personal Communications Sector, where he architected the turnaround strategy that doubled market share and revenues between 2002 and 2007.

"Innovation has always been a hallmark of Skype, and I want to innovate not only with the products we bring to market, but also with how we bring them to market," said Silverman. "Scott has an outstanding track record and will be able to help us apply best practices in staying ever more customer-focused and nimble, even while becoming larger."

Skype is the leader in online communications, revolutionizing the way people communicate through free and easy voice and video calling. The company has grown significantly since it was founded in 2003, and was acquired by eBay Inc. in September 2005. Today, the company has more than 309 million registered users around the world. In Q1 2008, Skype posted total revenues of $126 million, an increase of 61 percent over the prior year, while delivering a fifth consecutive quarter of profitability. Skype announced that since the company was launched in 2003, people around the world have talked to one another for more than 100 billion minutes using free Skype-to-Skype voice and video calls.

"I believe in Skype not only because I've been a user since the early days, but also because I'm convinced the opportunities ahead for Skype are tremendous given how the world is changing," said Durchslag. "Skype combines superior multimedia communications technology with making the world a better place by cost-effectively connecting consumers on a global scale, as well as enabling smaller businesses to grow without the unnecessary fuel consumption, costs and carbon pollution generated by needless travel. It is truly a privilege to join the Skype team and help to build a great company."

At Motorola, Scott led an 800 person global organization with sites across the U.S., Europe and Asia. He championed delivering simple, rich consumer experiences and building high tier co-created multimedia devices through partnerships he forged with Google, Microsoft, Yahoo!, and Kodak. Prior to Motorola, Scott was involved in Grand Central, a Silicon Valley enterprise software startup funded by Benchmark Capital, and he was one of the early thought leaders on web services as a Managing Director at The Chasm Group. Scott started his career at McKinsey & Company where he served American and Asian technology clients for eight years in their New York and Greater China offices. Scott was elected a partner in only four years and launched or led several international locations. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Chicago and received his MBA from Harvard Business School.

About Skype
Millions of people every day use Skype software to communicate with others through free voice and video calls, as well as instant messages. Skype's 309 million registered users have made more than 100 billion minutes worth of free Skype-to-Skype calls. Many people also use SkypeOut™ or one of our global subscriptions to save money when calling landlines and mobiles at home and abroad. No longer bound to the computer, Skype conversations can also be had on a broad range of cordless handsets, mobile devices and other Skype Certified™ hardware. We've made it easy for Skype users to list and recommend their favorite local businesses to the rest of the community with SkypeFind. And even when you're fluent in Skype, there is always more to discover: hundreds of third-party developers have created software plug-ins that make Skype even more useful. All of this makes Skype the leading global internet communications company.

Skype is an eBay company (NASDAQ: EBAY), and you can learn more and get Skype at www.skype.com.

Access to a broadband Internet connection is required for Skype and all Skype Certified devices and accessories. Skype is not a replacement for your traditional telephone service and cannot be used for emergency calling.

Skype, SkypeIn, SkypeOut, Skype Me, Skype Certified, Skypecasts, associated logos and the "S" symbol are trademarks of Skype Limited.

###

SCOTT DURCHSLAG
Corporate Vice President & General Manager
Global xProducts, Mobile Devices
Motorola, Inc.

Scott Durchslag leads the Global xProducts group reporting directly to the President of Motorola’s Mobile Devices Business. Global xProducts is focused on co-creating Mobile Devices with rich experiences together with key strategic partners and managing partner ecosystems. xProducts will commercialize new experience-based devices and innovate new business models.

Previously, Scott Durchslag was Corporate Vice President and General Manager for Motorola’s Mobile Devices business in South Asia. He led a dramatic turnaround of the business that grew market share, doubled revenue, and quadrupled profit in one year.

Scott joined Motorola in 2002 as Corporate Vice President of Strategy and Business Development for Motorola’s Personal Communications Sector. Scott defined PCS’ “MotoThunder” turnaround strategy and growth priorities during a crucial period in the turnaround of the sector. He was also responsible for acquisitions, the forging of alliances and partnerships as well as running PCS’ global intellectual property business. He negotiated the strategic alliance with Microsoft and oversaw the early development of Motorola’s first MPx device, based on Microsoft’s Mobile Windows operating system.

Prior to joining Motorola, Scott was a Managing Director at the Chasm Group, serving leading technology companies in Silicon Valley on their go-to-market strategies. Previously, he was an entrepreneur in an enterprise software start-up called Grand Central Communications in San Francisco that is a pioneer in the rapidly growing web services space.

Before 2000, Scott spent eight years with McKinsey & Company, the world’s leading international management consultancy. He started at McKinsey in New York, serving leading telecommunications and financial services companies. He then went on to help open the McKinsey office in India, and later led offices in Kuala Lumpur and Greater China. He also founded the Asian high technology practice, and advised the government of Malaysia on the creation of their successful Multimedia Super Corridor. He was elected a partner in only four years, and became the youngest office manager in the history of McKinsey & Company.

Scott was selected as the 1985 Truman Scholar from Illinois by the United States Congress. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a degree in political science, history, and literature from the University of Chicago in 1987. He earned his M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School in 1991, where he was a research assistant for Professor Michael Porter.

Posted by Phil Wolff at 02:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)