Month: October 2011
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Looking for a New Gig? Consider a Job at the Internet Society!
Continue Reading: Looking for a New Gig? Consider a Job at the Internet Society!Interested in a new work role? Looking to make a change from what you are doing now?
If you have a passion for the Internet – and for protecting the openness of the Internet – then please consider applying for one of open positions at the Internet Society. We have several new positions open, including:
- Sr. Manager, Next Generation Leaders Programme
- Internet Development Manager for Africa
- Application Development Specialist
- Sr. Director of Business Development and Resource Mobilization
I’m excited about joining the Internet Society and would love to welcome others onboard!
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Is Skype Soon To Release New APIs? Skype Renames Public API And Extends “Plugged into Skype” Partner Program
Continue Reading: Is Skype Soon To Release New APIs? Skype Renames Public API And Extends “Plugged into Skype” Partner ProgramToday brings two changes from Skype to their developer programs. First, in an effort to bring some clarity to their existing application programming interfaces (APIs), they have renamed the “Skype Public API” to be called the “Skype Desktop API.” As noted in a Skype blog post:
In Aug 2004, we made the Skype Desktop API available to encourage third-party innovation and integration with Skype. The Skype Desktop API allows Partners to access Skype functionality through the Skype desktop client via a text-based command protocol. The intent is not to duplicate Skype functionality but to complement the Skype desktop client with additional features and/or capabilities (e.g., call recording).
This is the API that pretty much all developers have had to use until recently where you application interacts directly with a Skype client. This also means that you have to have a Skype client running to use the API, which has been an additional annoyance for many developers. Developers have long desired an ability to connect directly into the Skype cloud without needing to run a client. Many of us had hoped that “SkypeKit” would be that client-less connection… but it, too, requires a client. UPDATE: Multiple friends pointed out to…
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The Creepy – And Insecure – Side of iOS and Android Apps
Continue Reading: The Creepy – And Insecure – Side of iOS and Android AppsWant to see the dark side of mobile apps? Just read this great bit of research from Troy Hunt:Secret iOS business; what you don’t know about your apps
As people have noted in the comments, “iOS” (Apple’s operating system for iPhones and iPads) is purely the platform Troy Hunt did his research on… but he’s really talking about issues with mobile applications.
I’m my unfortunately sure that these type of issues will also be there on apps on Android and probably on other mobile operating systems from Microsoft, RIM, WebOS, etc.
These are application design issues.
The article starts off with the incredibly inefficient case of stuffing large images from “regular” websites down the mobile pipe to the phone… and then simply “resizing” them with “width” and “height” attributes. This is just laziness”efficiency” on the app developers part in that they are simply “repurposing their existing content” for a mobile audience, i.e. it’s too much work/effort for them to create and track a separate smaller image for a mobile environment so they will just send you the larger one and eat up your data plan bandwidth.
But Troy Hunt goes on to talk about far worse issues… he calls…
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150 Years Ago Today, the USA Got Wired!
Continue Reading: 150 Years Ago Today, the USA Got Wired!A great article in the San Francisco Examiner today about the completion, 150 years ago today, of the transcontinental telegraph here in the United States:150 years ago, a primitive Internet united the USA
I think “a primitive Internet” might be a bit of a stretch… but then again I’m one of those network people who think of the “Internet” as a “network of networks”… and this first interconnection was really just creating that initial network!
Nuances aside, it’s an enjoyable article to read…
I found this an interesting commentary on the disruption of the communication channels that came before:
Indeed, the Pony Express, which boasted it could deliver a letter from Sacramento to St. Joseph, Mo., in the unheard of time of 10 days when it began operations on April 3, 1860, shut down 19 months later — on the same day the transcontinental telegraph went live.
Though dramatic, that was a short-term effect. “But the longer-term effect was we connected the nation in real time. …,” says Fischer. “For the first time, businesses could do business nationally. The government could communicate nationally in almost real time.”
Well worth a read to understand the challenges that went into…
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My Rant: Who Are We Building RTCWEB/WebRTC For? Telephony Developers or Web Developers?
Continue Reading: My Rant: Who Are We Building RTCWEB/WebRTC For? Telephony Developers or Web Developers?Yesterday morning I did something I haven’t done in eons. Many years, probably. (I can’t remember.) I fired off a “rant” on an IETF mailing list.
I’ve been a huge proponent of the “RTCWEB/WebRTC” work going on in the “RTCWEB” Working of the IETF and the “WebRTC” of the W3C. I’ve mentioned it in many of my presentations. I’ve advocated for people to join the mailing lists. I’ve written about it a good bit on Voxeo’s standards blog when I was at Voxeo.
We have an opportunity to make it easy for web developers to add “real-time communications” via voice, video, IM, etc., to web applications. We can make that work from directly within the browser.
Think of it… HTML5 with the ability to quickly add voice, video, chat… and without the need for a browser plugin or extension in Flash, Java, etc. (the limitation of all of today’s proprietary options).
It’s the opportunity to move real-time communications into the very fabric of the Web.
Awesome potential!
The work has been moving along quite rapidly in both the IETF and the W3C. Extremely active (high-volume!) mailing lists. Many Internet-Draft documents being created. Regular conference calls, interim meetings, face-to-face meetings. Some…
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Can Alec Saunder Woo Developers Back to the Blackberry Platform?
Continue Reading: Can Alec Saunder Woo Developers Back to the Blackberry Platform?Can he do it? Can he get developers to actually care enough about the Blackberry / Playbook platform to come and build apps?Today my friend Alec Saunders, RIM’s newly minted “VP of Developer Relations and Ecosystem Development”, took to the stage of the Blackberry “DevCon Americas” event in San Francisco to make the case to the assembled crowd. Jim Courtney passed along to me the link to the livecast of the event and I did take a moment to tune in and check it out. (Apparently a recording will be available at some point.)
Alec has a theatre background and is always fun to watch present… he has a certain dynamic energy that is good to see. In the few minutes I watched he seemed very much in his element:
Now, whether he will actually have any success is another question… despite his stats that the BlackBerry AppStore is more profitable for developers than the Android Marketplace, I don’t know if the broader world of developers will really notice. From what I see the momentum seems to be elsewhere…
I wish him the best, though… and Alec, when you read this, you can know that some of your friends…
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Awesome Comic -> The Bright Side to the Blackberry Outage
Continue Reading: Awesome Comic -> The Bright Side to the Blackberry OutageA truly awesome way to start my Monday… courtesy of RWW, this great cartoon from Rob Cottingham showing the “bright side” of the Blackberry outage:
Of course, we iPhone owners could have a similar discovery… although whether or not our phone connection would actually work is a different question… (but did any of us truly get an iPhone for the phone piece? 😉
Great comic, Rob!
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It’s Official! For Better Or Worse, Skype Is Now Part of Microsoft
Continue Reading: It’s Official! For Better Or Worse, Skype Is Now Part of MicrosoftAnd so begins the next chapter of Skype… first it was a scruffy little startup taking on the telecom world… then it became somewhat bizarrely part of eBay… then it went back to a private company owned primarily by Silver Lake Partners… and then… to the utter amazement of so many of us… Skype announced it would be acquired by Microsoft!And today that acquisition is official. Microsoft announced in a news release and Skype announced in a blog post and video from CEO Tony Bates that the acquisition has formally been concluded.
The deal is done. Skype CEO Tony Bates is now the president of the Skype Dvision within Microsoft reporting directly to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. I found this phrase of the news release to be interesting (my emphasis added):
Microsoft and Skype will remain focused on their shared goal of connecting all people across all devices and accelerating both companies’ efforts to transform real-time communications for consumers and enterprise customers.
My interest was not only in the “across all devices”, which has been a large part of Skype’s goal for some time… but also in the use of “real-time communications”. For a while that was a phrase…
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Survey: Only 40% of Canadians Password-Protect Their Cell Phones
Continue Reading: Survey: Only 40% of Canadians Password-Protect Their Cell PhonesOnly 40% of Canadian cell phone users password-protect their phones or use other privacy options, a survey by Canada’s privacy commissioner found. The results of the 2000-person survey were released in August and written up in a Globe And Mail piece entitled “How private is that text message?“.
When I saw the headline, I honestly thought it was going to be something about the security of SMS messages… but in fact it was about the security of the cell phones themselves. If the phones aren’t secured then someone can go in and look at your text messages. Ergo… the link-bait title of the article. (And yes, it got me to look.)
Still, it had some interesting data points such as the fact that the users from age 18 to 34 were the ones most likely to use privacy tools, which is good to see, since they are probably the ones pumping the most information out online.
Nice to see, too, that 82 percent did not think police should have access to your online usage info without a warrant.
I was surprised, in all honestly, about the 40% number… I actually might have thought of it being lower as I…
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Voxeo Customer Summit 2011, “Unlocked and Loaded”, Launches Tonight!
Continue Reading: Voxeo Customer Summit 2011, “Unlocked and Loaded”, Launches Tonight!Tonight I’ll be thinking of all my friends and former colleagues at Voxeo as they launch the Voxeo Customer Summit 2011 at the JW Marriott Grande Lakes hotel in Orlando. With the great theme of “Unlocked and Loaded“, they have an incredibly packed agenda that will make it truly an outstanding event. Lots of great technical talks mixed in with business talks… some voice biometrics… product announcements… plus a great party and other activities!
Plus the ever geeky and wacky Chris Pirillo as show emcee and Joseph Jaffe providing the keynote talk… it should be a great time for all!
While I’m no longer a Voxeon, I’ll be thinking of the crew there and wishing them all the best. It’s a big event and will really help the people who attend to learn so much more about building communication applications using Voxeo’s platforms and services. Cool stuff!
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