Category: Google
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Google’s Android and the future of the (open?) mobile Internet
Continue Reading: Google’s Android and the future of the (open?) mobile InternetIn just a few minutes, at 10:30am US Eastern time, Google and T-Mobile will be in New York City to announce the launch of the first Android handset.Predictably, the blogosphere is buzzing with posts and articles.
I expect, quite honestly, to be a bit underwhelmed by the initial launch… after all, Android is still evolving. We’ll see – the fact that stories are out that Amazon is launching a DRM-free music service along with the Android phone is certainly an interesting dynamic.
Today’s launch aside, the launch of Android is really the next step in the ongoing discussion about what the future of the mobile Internet looks like. Will it be controlled by only the carriers? Or will we as consumers have the freedom and choice to use the apps we want? Android holds out that potential – if the carriers let it be used that way. This morning I recorded a short video on the subject:
If you would like, please do join us on today’s Squawk Box at 11am US Eastern time to discuss what all this means. Undoubtedly I’ll be writing more on this here as will others across the VoIP blogosphere in…
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Four reasons I am choosing NOT to cut the landline cord
Continue Reading: Four reasons I am choosing NOT to cut the landline cordTwelve days ago I asked the question, “Do I cut the landline cord and move my new home phone number into the cloud?“, and the responses have been great to read. Today, I can write the answer…No, I will NOT cut the cord.
Around noon today my landline in Keene should be installed by Fairpoint Communications (who recently bought all of Verizon’s landline business in Maine, NH and Vermont).
Why did I finally give in and get a landline installed? Four reasons:
FAX – Unbelievably to me, perhaps the primary reason for keeping a landline is an old archaic technology that I absolutely can’t stand… fax. This was brought home to me during the process of closing on the purchase of our Keene home and the sale of our Burlington home. As much as we may hate it, there are still some transactions that require fax. There were documents that had to be faxed to the bank. Documents that had to be faxed to lawyers. Documents that had to be faxed to real estate agents. To contractors.
To a techie like me, it was unbelievably annoying not to be able to simply use email. But in many cases,…
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Do I cut the landline cord and move my new home phone number into the cloud?
Continue Reading: Do I cut the landline cord and move my new home phone number into the cloud?UPDATE – May 21: Today I posted my answer to the question…
In our new home, do I get a land line?
Or do I move our home phone number into “the cloud”?
We’re closing on our home in Keene, NH, next Thursday and as we get set with the utilities that is one of the key questions on my mind. Do I actually “cut the cord” and NOT sign up for a land line with Verizon/Fairpoint?[1]
On one level, we don’t need it. My wife and I both have our cell phones. Our daughter is six and isn’t yet at the age to make phone calls. I work in the world of voice-over-IP and can certainly get a solution there.
Why should we get a land line?
ADVANTAGES OF A LAND LINE
In thinking about this, it seems to me there are the following reasons to get a land line:
911 – UPDATE: As PhoneBoy reminded me in a comment, the overarching reason for having a landline is 911! A landline is the only guaranteed way to dial 911 and have emergency services arrive at your house. Precisely because it is tied to your geographical location it does indeed…
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It’s about the platform – Google finally answers the “Gphone” speculation… with an Android!
Continue Reading: It’s about the platform – Google finally answers the “Gphone” speculation… with an Android!“It’s about an open platform, stupid!” While I didn’t include Google when I first wrote my post about how voice is really all about application platforms, I did note in the comments that I had intended to do so… and today’s announcement really shows that they should be in anyone’s list of telephony application platforms. As announced on the Google blog with “Where’s my Gphone?“, Google today announced the Open Handset Alliance and the associated set of forthcoming software called Android. The front page of the Open Handset Alliance provides a rather compelling (to me) statement:
What would it take to build a better mobile phone?
A commitment to openness, a shared vision for the future, and concrete plans to make the vision a reality.
Welcome to the Open Handset Alliance™, a group of more than 30 technology and mobile companies who have come together to accelerate innovation in mobile and offer consumers a richer, less expensive, and better mobile experience. Together we have developed Android™, the first complete, open, and free mobile platform.
We are committed to commercially deploy handsets and services using the Android Platform in the second half of 2008. An early… -
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Google acquires GrandCentral… and enters further into the PSTN side of telecommunications
Continue Reading: Google acquires GrandCentral… and enters further into the PSTN side of telecommunicationsNews breaking out today is that Google has acquired GrandCentral for something around $50 million. GrandCentral is a service that gives you one phone number that can ring multiple numbers, provide one common voicemail – and all sorts of the other features (see “howitworks” for a list of features). As the GrandCentral blog entry says:
We started GrandCentral because we wanted to create a service that puts users in control of their voice communications and not the other way around. As you have discovered, with GrandCentral you get all of your phone calls through just one number that never changes and you can link and ring up to six phones to ring when somebody calls you. But that’s just the start. You can set different rules for each caller (some ring all your phones, other can go straight to voicemail), create personal voicemail greetings for each of your callers, and even check your voicemail on the web with all of your messages in just one inbox. We’ll even save your messages for as long as you want.
I first learned of GrandCentral quite some time ago from Andy’s blog and subsequently heard GrandCentral CEO Craig Walker talk out…
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Giving old VoIP equipment new life in developing countries?
Continue Reading: Giving old VoIP equipment new life in developing countries?Over on one of Google’s blogs, there is a post “New life for network equipment” about how the Network Startup Resource Center helps take networking equipment that is “old” by Western standards and give it new life in other parts of the world where equipment such as routers and switches may be too expensive to easily purchase. First off, kudos to Google for supporting such an organization with their own donations. As they say in the blog entry, it’s very easy for those of us in the always-on part of the world to take that connectivity for granted. And yet for a very large portion of the world, there is no such guarantee for connectivity.
This post, though, did make me think… what happens to all the “old” VoIP gear when it is replaced? We are at the stage now in the evolution of VoIP where people are replacing IP-PBXs with newer models (from the same or different vendors). SIP phones have been out long enough that they, too, are being swapped out for newer models.
Where are they going? Landfills? Probably.
But yet some of those pieces of equipment may work perfectly fine in other parts…
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Click-to-Call, Google Maps, security – and the fundamental disruption to the carrier telephony space
Continue Reading: Click-to-Call, Google Maps, security – and the fundamental disruption to the carrier telephony space(Originally posted at http://dyork.livejournal.com/247741.html)Over on “Voice of VOIPSA“, Dustin Trammel wrote a long post called “Click-to-Harrass” that discusses “click-to-call” services and specifically the new Google Maps click to call capability. I wrote a comment that inadvertantly wound up being almost as long as Dustin’s article. Given that it had been a topic I was thinking about writing about here anyway, I decided to cross-post my comment here as well. Dustin,
Nice piece. TechCrunch also had a post yesterday speculating that Google had pulled Click-To-Call because of harrassment issues, although it seems to have just been a temporary service outage as the service is back running today (used it myself this morning).
The interesting thing, though, is that you can see the immense value to the consumer for this type of service. Over the past few days I’ve been testing it myself with calling various local businesses here in Vermont. I have to say it has worked great. Find them in Google Maps, click the “call” button, wait for the ring of my phone, press the “Talk” button on my wireless handset and… ta da… I’m connecting to the business. It is a little…
