Archive for July 10th, 2008
Sangoma acquires Paraxip… open source-focused hardware meets enterprise software
Earlier this week there was the announcement that Sangoma was acquiring Montreal-based startup Paraxip for $4.8 million which was interesting to me on a couple of levels. First, I’ve known David Mandelstam from Sangoma for now around 8 years since way back when I was part of the open source startup e-smith up in Ottawa. David and I have continued to meet at trade shows over all these years and he’s a great guy. So I’m pleased for him that Sangoma is growing. It’s also a...
The Dead Zone: AT&T’s iPhone 3G Coverage Woes
Excited about buying Apple’s new iPhone 3G, which goes on sale tomorrow? Pumped about those blazing-fast 3G Internet speeds? Hope you don’t live in beautiful Bozeman, Montana; Burlington, Vermont; or Des Moines, Iowa… Those are just a few places where your new iPhone will download Web pages just as slow as the old one did — because AT&T hasn’t set up its 3G network there yet. And how about just getting decent phone service in Fairfield County, CT? Take a l...
TranSwitch Switches Its Stock for Centillium Cash
It is a sad commentary on the state of the broadband chip market when a chip maker essentially gives itself away to a rival, who gets much needed-cash in exchange for stock and the promise of a future market. TranSwitch, a broadband chip maker, has agreed to buy fellow clip maker Centillium Communications for $42.8 million in cash and stock. Centillium’s fortunes rose and fell with the DSL market, though in its 11 years of standalone existence it never managed to turn a profit. TranSwitch...
Storage? You Want Storage? How ‘Bout 1.5TB?
Seagate today broke through a long-held barrier and released a 1.5 terabyte version of the Barracuda 7200.11. The storage is 500GB more than any other 3.5-inch desktop hard drive and is accomplished through extra refinement of perpendicular magnetic recording that allows it to fit 375GB on each of its four platters. (Bet you didn’t know it got that technical, but how on earth are you going to fit all of that data if you don’t get very, very technical!) The density also helps imp...
Congrats to my Canadian friends on Rogers dropping iPhone and RIM charges…
Having lived in Canada for 5 years and dealt with Rogers Communications being really the only GSM game in town, I understood the jubilation yesterday of Canadians like Jim Courtney when Rogers dropped their prices for iPhone plans. Faced with a lot of negative publicity in advance of tomorrow’s iPhone launch in Canada… faced with 60,000 people signing an online petition… and facing Apple redirecting some iPhones away from Canada over to Europe… Rogers caved and dropped it...
Look Ma, No HDTV Wires!
No wires! Love that concept no matter how you mean it! Belkin’s FlyWire now makes it possible to place your HDTV where you want–without cables. Featuring an intuitive and simple setup, FlyWire wirelessly connects devices such as Blu-ray players, receivers, video game consoles and set-top boxes to HDTVs and projectors, transmitting 1080p HD. As the first offering in the FlyWire family, this solution provides a whole-home range with the capability of penetrating walls and AV...
Comcast - We won’t block Vonage or any other VoIP provider
According to eFluxMedia, Comcast is “working on rehabilitating its name and implementing reasonable management techniques through a new partnership with VoIP service provider Vonage.” Vonage and Comcast said they will work on ensuring adequate management techniques to avoid network congestion to ensure high quality VoIP services. I should point out that Comcast tarnished their own reputation when they intentionally degraded P2P traffic, particularly Bittorrent, a heavy bandwidth a...
Social Networking Catches Mobile Madness
MySpace launched a social networking experience designed for the iPhone (available free at the App Store) today that will take advantage of the touch interface. As part of the launch, they sent out a fact sheet detailing some mobile stats that I found pretty compelling, notably that of MySpace’s 115 million members, up to 5 million are expected to use the mobile site by the end of the year, with 3.1 million using it now. And most of those users come through MySpace’s mobile web sit...
Cisco Manager Meets Jurassic Park
You remember the scene in Jurassic Park where the there was no power or working phones on the island so they head to the control room? Lex Murphy, the young hacker girl, gets on a computer, works some computer wizardry and gets the power and phones back online and is able boot up the door locks and other systems - though its not enough to keep the raptors from getting to them. Well, there’s a funny Youtube parody video that solves the apparent “IP phone” outage simply by restar...
Ban dihydrogen monoxide
If you can’t see the video, follow this link. On the other hand, some people pay more per gallon for the stuff than they do for gasoline. var OutbrainPermaLink=’http://blog.tomevslin.com/2008/07/ban-dihydrogen.html’; var OB_demoMode = false; if ( typeof(OB_Script)!=’undefined’ ) OutbrainStart(); else { var OB_Script = true; var str = “”; document.write(str); } Social networks: tag with del.icio.us | digg it | reddit | Stumble It! | o...
MediaMax, a.k.a. TheLinkUp, Is Dead
MediaMax, a San Diego-based startup that allowed you to upload and share big files and create a social network around it, is dead. “We regret to inform you that we will be closing The Linkup service on Friday, August 8 at 5:00 pm PDT,” the company wrote on its web site this morning. Good riddance, because it was a brain-dead idea to begin with. More importantly, the company constantly lost users’ data — not a good survival strategy considering data is your business. The...
PR 203: How to Pitch a Blogger (or at least How to Pitch Jeff Pulver in 2008)
I enjoy hearing from my friends about new products and services that excite them. This is one of the ways I discover new things. But solicitations from PR professionals who are total strangers to me generally come across like spam. When Im on the receiving end of an email pitch from a stranger, this is generally a result of someone working for a PR agency who was given an assignment to contact the blogosphere about their clients products and services. Most likely the person choose the ...
It’s Official: PlanetEye has Launched!
Since I joined PlanetEye a year ago, it has been fascinating to see how the company has evolved, taken new and exciting directions, and started to establish itself as a vibrant player in the online travel planning market. In the process, PlanetEye has gone from a ultra-private beta involving the help of friends and family to a private beta to a public beta. Today, we’re excited to announce the official launch of PlanetEye as a one-stop destination for all your travel planning needs. (As y...
Customer Problem with HotRecorder and Skype
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.
Next stop: Jackson Hole, Wyoming
Im up early and heading to the airport. Today I am heading out to attend the 2nd Internet Cowboys un-Conference taking place in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I am looking forward to being part of the group of people attending, contributing to and participating in this event taking place on a ranch. Im honored to be invited and have the opportunity to participate in the experience. Im not sure what my Internet connectivity will be like but I look forward to posting photos and videos from ...
Your Biggest Competitor Could be Bad Design
One of my college teachers had a whimsical way of getting students to think about what they were doing and why. Instead of simply asking them to solve a problem or accomplish a task, he asked us “how can you make it worse?” or “how can you ensure that this project will fail?” This post at Direct Creative Blog reminded me of him: 5 ways to kill good copy with bad design. Although the post talks about printed pieces, what it has to say applies equally well — perhaps...
Yahoo, Now Offering Search as a Web Service
About six months ago, I heard that Yahoo was contemplating offering its entire search platform as a web service, much like Amazon’s S3 storage and EC2 computing services. Since the rumor was short on details and Yahoo was already in the midst of a gut-wrenching upheaval, I didn’t put much stock in it. Apparently I should have, for Yahoo today announced the beta version of BOSS (Build Your Own Search Service), which essentially turns its core search and other related technologies into a fre...
T.Boone.tv — The Green Oil Baron That’s Just Too Hip
I’m officially a friend of the famed oil baron-turned wind developer T. Boone Pickens…on Facebook and MySpace. I’ve also hopped onto his Twitter feed, joined his Ning-powered social network, and asked for a connection on LinkedIn. Now I’m just waiting to hear his last.fm play list (Johnny Cash meets Dixie Chicks?), follow a life-streaming T.Boone.tv channel (24-7 Pickens!), and read his shared Netflix reviews (”There Will Be Blood” – 4 ½ stars, “LOLmilkshake”). ...
iPhone Owners Seem Crazy for Games
Ever since Apple put out its Software Developer Kit in March, game developers have been racing to create titles for the presumed market victor. But how much of a demand for them is there really? Based on the data from Cellufun, AOL’s designated mobile game portal since April, quite a lot. The company just told us that compared with other phone owners, iPhone gamers are generating four times the number of page views on Cellufun titles and double the time playing. (That’s an avera...
Did Comcast Just Admit to Vonage Traffic-shaping?
I received an emailed press release from Comcast this morning about their plans to work with Vonage to address “the reasonable network management of Internet services” that left me a tad confused. Comcast had already admitted to massaging P2P traffic, sparking an online uproar that resulted in the company backing down and announcing plans to use different kinds of network management techniques. (They massaged P2P traffic by either delaying or blocking P2P packets outright, which cau...
Alltop - My Blog Added to VoIP Blogs Category
Many of you know Guy Kawasaki, and if you don’t you should. He’s on my blog roll and I’ve blogged about him a few times. Guy always has a lot of interesting things on the go - and his books are highly recommended. The latest thing I’ve come across that he’s involved with is Alltop. What is it? Well, it’s another blog aggregation site - in this case, “all the top” blogs and news sources for a variety of categories. Their team picks what they feel ar...
Yahoo Bets Big on Free Game Downloads
With so much venture funding going into web-based, ad-driven casual games (both the companies that create them and those that monetize them), you’d think the gaming industry as a whole was moving in that direction. I certainly did, at least until today. But Yahoo Games just told me that starting this week, they’re going to host free, downloadable casual games embedded with video ads. (Think games that play more like TV shows, with commercials in between breaks.) Fifty of them are ...
Of Course the Government Cares About Your Privacy
Today saw the first of at least two Congressional hearings concerning managing privacy on the web in relation to online advertising. The hearing today involved executives from Google, Facebook, Microsoft and startup NebuAd as well as the Federal Trade Commission and two public policy groups. For a complete listing, check out the hearing, although it clocks in at about two hours and is very, very repetitive. Everyone present agreed that advertising on the web is not bad because it allows for all...
Asian Lines Already Formed for iPhone Launch
Want to be the first on your block to have the new iPhone? How about the first in your country? How about first in the world? Well, over in Asia, fans (is that right word? how about rabid consumers) are already in line to pick up the hot little gadget. Yes, indeed! According to the New York Times, the July 11 launch will be the first chance for Asian consumers to own an iPhone, and related websites have been swamped with inquiries and early orders. In Japan, one of the world’s ...
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News, opinions and announcements about fast changing communication tools and technologies, from various blogs and ezine.