New Florence. New Renaissance.

If Skype should fall

The Economist on alternatives if the legal wrangling over Skype persists

“For Macintosh users, iChat is everything you would expect of Apple—slick, simple and with stunning graphics. Its voice quality is even better than Skype’s. The video chat feature lets you set up multi-person conferences on the fly. And it is less of a bandwidth hog than Skype. All you need is an internet connection and a video camera, plus an account with one of the more popular instant-messaging services, such as AIM, Google Talk, Jabber or MobileMe—and, of course, a Macintosh computer running Mac OS X.

The choice for Windows users is wider, though few of the products are as polished as iChat. SightSpeed comes close. It is delightfully simple to set up and use, and provides excellent 30 frames-a-second video with crisp audio and little delay. You can also send video e-mail and text chat with its built in instant-messaging service. And it works on Macs as well as PCs.

If making “SkypeOut” calls to landline and mobile phones—as well as making free voice and video calls from computer to computer—is important to you, then look no further than Gizmo5. This is identical to Skype in most respects save one: it uses open standards for managing calls, though its compression algorithms and client software are as proprietary as Skype’s. However, by embracing the popular internet-signalling standard called Session Initiation Protocol (SIP), Gizmo5’s free software can work seamlessly with other SIP-based networks, including the phone companies’.”

Re-inventing the home/small office phone

David Pogue at NY Times writes about the Panasonic KX-TG7432 and the Verizon Hub (pictured) – two home/small office phones with all kinds of new features that combine landline, mobile and VoIP phone features.

Savvy Office Telephony

Karen Auby at Plantronics kindly had me try out the Savi Office. As I was reviewing the materials, I saw office “hoteling” and it brought memories of my time at PwC London in late 80s. No assigned desks – you punched in your code and calls magically found at the desk you were at that day. Pretty cool stuff 20 years ago. Today you could not give that phone away.

Savi Office is a headset which integrates PC and desktop based calls. Good looking (in charging mode in photo, an alternate over-the-ear headset is also available), great DECT 6.0 sound quality, and mobility of up to 350 feet from base (charge lasts as long as 9 hours if you stay close to base).  You can add multiple headsets per base so you can do today’s version of “hoteling” employees, conference in 3 other Savi users on a call and it comes with its Per Sono application – which offers Unified Communications features to integrate IP based calling.

For a home based office I think its sibling Calisto Pro is a better choice (it also allows Bluetooth integration to your mobile phone), but for a larger office where you don’t want your employees tethered to their seats, Savi is, well, a savvy choice.

Savi offers an optional To Go option which allows BT calling. The way things are going I can see Savi like the Calisto also integrate BT calling in the future, but in a small office setting having multiple BT devices may cause some contention issues. Like London traffic :)

The other communications "unification"

Microsoft, Cisco, Siemens and others have been talking for a while about Unified Communications. This week Google announced Voice. But like Larry Dignan I was intrigued by Plantronics Savi due next month. It promises to unify into a single head set landline, mobile or VoIP calls. Solves as Larry says the “last 10 feet” problem.

This I got to see, I said.

So I reached out to Karen Auby at Plantronics volunteering to be a guinea pig for Savi. And she goes – why wait till April? She sent me their Calisto Pro, the early version of the Savi.

And sure enough I can pair the headset via Bluetooth to my PDA. I can use it as a wireless headset for landline calls – the phone uses low-interference DECT 6.0 functionality (or I can plug another headset in the 2.5mm jack on the phone). I can make Skype calls on the PC with that headset (the computer has to be connected via USB to base unit).

So now my mind is racing – can I use it when I am traveling? (sure, since it is paired with my PDA but the headset charger is built into the base unit so I would need to lug that and power unit along). Can I stream A2DP music to it? (No). Ok, so I am getting greedy, but for a home office unifying all 3 modes – landline, soft and mobile - into one headset is pretty nifty.

The Savi should increase the range the headset or phone can be away from the base unit. And as Larry writes it also lets Plantronics dabble in software.

Which reminds me – I better upgrade my Grand Central subscription to Google Voice.

Country, er Global, Code 883

"There is now a single calling code for the globe, +883, that has recently been created by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). To help businesses benefit from this one number, convenience Voxbone has released the iNum — a single number that enables anyone to establish a local presence anywhere in the world."

Business VoIP

Graphic credit Dreamstime.com

Cisco's next wave of innovations

From tele-presence to collaboration through their Webex acquisition to investments in social networking , Cisco is innovating a next generation of networked applications for its own global operations and for its customers.

I liked their internal payback for the tele-presence investment - cut travel budget by 20%

Read more at Fortune.

And as Phil Wainewright reports puts Cisco in the path of Adobe. And of course,  "co-optetion" with  Microsoft which is pushing its own Unified Communications strategy.

The New Railroad

USA Today has a story on Verizon's $ 23 billion investment in its FiOS network. Back breaking stuff for its workers - but they are innovating like their forefathers a few generations ago. And kudos to Verizon for persisting in spite of Wall Street's reaction to the investment.

VoIP variants

Michael Arrington at TechCruch points out services like Jajah and Hullo which allow you to use your POTS (or mobile phone) to make VoIP calls. None is perfect as he points out - but then they do not need you to buy special phones or head sets either as the more established players like Skype or Vonage require.