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December 31, 2003
FCC Chairman's Interview in Silicon Valley
On Monday, one news item that I forgot to mention in my blog was an interview that FCC Chairman Powell recently did with the editors and reporters of the San Jose Mercury News.
Two paragraphs from the interview which still stand out in my mind are:
"Now to be a phone company, you don't have to weave tightly the voice service into the infrastructure. You can ride it on top of the infrastructure. So if you're a Vonage, you own no infrastructure. You own no trucks. You roll to no one's house. They turn voice into a application and shoot it across one of these platforms. And, suddenly, you're in your business.
And that's why if you're the music industry, you're scared. And if you're the television studio, movie industry, you're scared. And if you're an incumbent infrastructure carrier, you'd better be scared. Because this application separation is the most important paradigm shift in the history of communications, and will change things forever. . . . I have no problem if a big and venerable company no longer exists tomorrow, as long as that value is transferred somewhere else in the economy."
These are very interesting words to think about as we try to predict the FCC's regulatory approach towards IP Communications in 2004.
Posted by jeff at 09:38 PM | Permalink
2004: The Year for IP Communications
I'm still amazed how the momentum towards IP Communications in general and VoIP specifically happened in the second half of 2003.
A year ago, back in December, 2002, Simon Romero of the New York Times wrote a pivital VoIP story which when followed by another story he filed in early January, 2003 helped set the pace for the business and consumer press's coverage of VoIP technologies in 2003.
A year ago this week I spend my time babysitting Free World Dialup as it grew from inception thru it's first 5,000 subscribers and it was a learning experience on the challenges of delivering real-time communications into the living rooms of our customer's homes.
Nothing was simple or easy.
I had decided to launch FWD in November, 2002 because at the time while I still produced the VoIP Industry's trade show, VON (Voice on the Net) I did not own the VON Conferences, and I was looking for something to do with some of my available time.
While I ended up re-purchasing VON back from Key3Media in late January, 2003, I did so at the time because of my love of IP Communications and my belief that over time, the communications industry would be forever changed by the advent of VoIP.
From my foggy crystal ball on the eve of 2004, things look line they are lining up for it to feel like 1999 all over again inside of the IP Communications Industry and in fact that 2004 will once again be our year.
We shall see.
2003 turned out to be quite a good year to be involved in the VoIP space and for some in 2004, the rewards of just being a survivor and making thru some of the worst capital market and venture capital sand storms will benefit all those who stayed in business and believed.
I'm looking at 2004 as the year that IP Communications just happened.
Posted by jeff at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 30, 2003
Free World Dialup's FREE Calling Promotion Ending Soon...
Special thanks to the Free World Dialup user community for taking notice of our free calling for the holiday's promotion.
Also, special thanks to those of you who helped promote our activities and made sure that our "holiday present" it wasn't a secret to everyone.
I do hope that some of you have been able to take advantage of our "social experiment" and place a free phone call to a friend and/or relative in one of the places which we enabled calling to.
I hope to apply what we learned from this recent experience and take it all into account when exploring the possibility of doing something similar again in 2004.
We will be implementing a hardware upgrade the week of January 5th which should significantly improve the performance of the FWD Network.
Best wishes for 2004!
Posted by jeff at 02:51 PM | Permalink
Returning to the Real World...
I had a great time in Maui and highly recommend this Rainbow Island to anyone who is thinking about taking a vacation in Hawaii.
I've had a great chance to recharge my personal batteries and I will be spending a little time on the Left Coast of the US before getting back to the office next Monday.
Posted by jeff at 02:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
WiSIP Update: USA Shipments start end of January
Products that generate RF emissions, and are sold in the US must conform to certain FCC requirements. The WiSIP has passed all of the testing for this requirement, and we are waiting for the FCC certification number in order to comply with the regulations.
This means that we will soon be in a position to start shipping in the USA the WiSIP phones to those people who have pending orders.
If you placed an order for a phone, we will be sure it is sent out as soon as the process is completed, which is expected to be late in January, 2004.
Please feel free to follow up directly with Fred Pulver if you have questions regarding the WiSIP.
Posted by jeff at 11:12 AM | Permalink
Looking for more Volunteers
With the continued growth of Free World Dialup, we can use some more Volunteers who have time to staff our 55555 welcome line.
If you are interested in becoming one of the FWD Volunteers, please email: jeffp@pulver.com.
Posted by jeff at 10:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (13)
Watching Waves and Fireplaces
I'm not sure which experience is more mesmerizing, staring at logs burning in a fireplace or standing on the shoreline on the north side of Maui and watching the waves crush and surfers doing their thing and entertaining those along the shoreline in the process.
Posted by jeff at 01:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Sgt Pepper's Lonely Heats Club Band: Soundtrack of my Vacation...
I have my kid's music teacher to thank for introducing them to The Beatles and selected songs from the Beatles' Abby Road and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band albums.
In fact, I've enjoyed listening to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band over and over and over and over again.
For the foreseeable future, whenever I hear one of the songs playing from Sgt. Peppers I will think back to the time I just spent on Maui.
Posted by jeff at 01:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 29, 2003
VoIP: Beyond Cheaper Phone Calls
A couple of weeks ago I spoke with a reporter from the Wall Street Journal who was doing a story on VoIP focusing on access charges and other costs associated with running a VoIP network.
After reading the piece earlier today, I'm glad that I was able to
indirectly help the writer refocus his attention to write about something else - the advent of lower costs associated with VoIP calls. (That wasn't my intention either.)
It is real clear to me that there is still a lot of outreach that needs to happen between those people who write business stories on VoIP and those people who will be directly affected by such stories.
Starting in January we will begin our media outreach for Spring 2004 VON to make sure that the voices of the industry are heard by those who need to hear it the most.
From my side, when looking at the costs of running a startup IP Communications service provider, the biggest cost to deal with will for a long time continue to be subscriber acquisition costs.
Forget about any access charge arbitrage or misunderstandings about how universal service fees are dealt with. The biggest costs that AT&T, Comcast, Time Warner and Vonage have to allocate for are - get this - MARKETING costs and the associated costs of obtaining and keeping new customers.
While there are some regulatory lawyers who would like nothing more than to focus the attention of the widespread adoption of VoIP on regulatory approaches to these new services, the fact remains that for the most part both start-ups and established operators have to anticipate to spend a large amount to create awareness about their service offerings and also make sure that their product has all of the bells and whistles needed to keep their new customers happy.
The established telcos have a significant advantage in this department since there is an implied level of "trust" between these companies and their existing customers. Start-ups will spend millions and millions to create branding an attempt to create an equal level of trust.
As we end 2003, the one thing all of these service offerings have in common is the ability for consumers to purchase dialing plans on broadband voice similar to how cellular minutes are being marketed.
While today the buy-in is that the monthly costs to subscribe to a IP Communication service provider will end up being cheaper than being serviced from alternative service providers, this may not always be the case, especially when the other "killer apps" for communications are discovered and customer channels are leveraged to sell these value-added services to their customers.
Hopefully when we are ending 2004 there will be other things that IP Communications will be known for by the mass media other than the fact that the costs using VoIP are a little bit less than other communication platforms.
Posted by jeff at 01:27 PM | Permalink
Getting Better: FREE calling is back!
Our FREE calling promotion on Free World Dialup is now back, and it is once again possible to place a free call into places like:
Australia, Canada, China, Germany, Israel, Sweden, UK and USA.
This promotion will end late in the day on December 31st.
Note: Except for calls into the USA/Canada, it is not possible to place calls to mobile phones.
To place a call, dial: *[country code] number on Free world Dialup.
For example:
--
USA/Canada *1
Australia *61
China: *86
Germany: *49
Israel: *972
Sweden: *46
UK: *44
--
Remember to call your friends and relatives and wish them a very Happy New Year!
:-)
Posted by jeff at 11:44 AM | Permalink | Comments (4)
After a week - I'm hooked on Maui Sky Fiber...
After a week of being a customer of Maui Sky Fiber, I have nothing but nice things to say about both their service and the enabling technology they are using from
IPWireless.
While there were a few times their service was best described as flaky, having high-speed access during my stay in Maui has helped make me feel "at home" especially since I had just expected to have high-speed access in my hotel room and the lack of high-speed access was one of the only disappointments I had when we checked into the hotel.
With the sustainable speeds of 512 down/128 up (and I was told I could get as much as a 3MB down), everyone in my family ended up using the portable computer as if they were at home.
I realize that this may sound as if we weren't on vacation, but having broadband access is quickly becoming a lifestyle choice and I'd like to believe that when living in an "always on" world, being able to stay connected is a good thing, even if it makes it a little difficult to get away from it all...
Posted by jeff at 01:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Looks like the "Hole" is getting Fixed!
I just noticed that calls on the FWD Network to the USA and Canada have now started working again. :-)
While the hole may not be 100% repaired yet, it seems to be fixed ok enough for now. :-)
Now except for calls into the USA/Canada, it is not possible to place calls to mobile phones.
To place a call, dial: *[country code] number on Free world Dialup.
For example:
--
USA/Canada *1
Australia *61
China: *86
Germany: *49
Israel: *972
UK: *44
--
Remember to call your friends and relatives and wish them a very Happy New Year!
Now I'm going to continue to listen to Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Heart Club Band....and try to remember that I'm supposed to still be "on vacation."
Posted by jeff at 12:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)
December 28, 2003
FWD: 110,000 Subscribers and Growing Fast!
For those of you who are keeping track, sometime earlier today we hit the 110,000 subscriber mark.
The number of new people signing up for FWD continues to grow at a record pace and is only being limited by the hardware we have in place at the moment that is running the FWD Network.
Our hourly new subscriber run-rates are running somewhere between 24 to 48 times where they were only 10 days ago!
Posted by jeff at 12:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
My IP Communications Revolution Handbook...
I had fully intended to end this year with the completed draft of a book detailing the coming IP Communications Revolution, with the hope of self-publishing the book in early 2004.
Right now all I have are the names of the chapters and a working draft of one chapter so my timing may be a little off. ;-)
The past fourteen months running Free World Dialup in combination of some of my other related activities has provided an unique opportunity to see some of the effects of the coming revolution and my hope is to be able to share some of these ideas before they happen - just in case there are some who would like to take advantage of the situation. :-)
Anyway, high on my personal "to-do" list and my list of New Years Resolutions is to allocate the time to complete at least a chapter every 1-2 weeks so that by mid-2004 the handbook can be submitted for publication.
Posted by jeff at 11:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Captain's Log: Quality of Service Expectations from things that are FREE
Human nature is an interesting thing.
I remember living thru an experience years ago when my mother decided one summer to start selling her chocolate chip cookies to the parents of kids at sleep away camp, after hearing years of praise from my friends and the visitors to our home.
For a modest sum, and for an amount which turned out to be below cost, my mom would take orders to send freshly baked cookies to the sons and daughters of her friends.
But once people had to pay for these cookies, the same: "great", "delicious", "wonderful", cookies all of a sudden started tasting: "burnt", "too hard", "crumbly", and just about any other word you can think of that describes something that is overly criticized.
After one summer of experience, many years ago, my mother has never tried "going commerical" again.
With FWD the stakes are different and unlike my mother I have no intention of trying to charge money for the service, yet there are already people complaining about our infrastructure, QoS issues on related free resourcess and more. ;-)
If Scotty the Engineer (from Star Trek) was working with the FWD Team, he would have advised against us moving forward at warp speed of to enable the free end-of-year experiement due to anticipated server loading and other issues.
And while I agree we can never have enough "dilithium crystals" to drive FWD faster, I went forward with holiday promotion anyway since I felt "the needs of the many outweight the needs of the few or the one" (Star Trek III) and in the end the intended effect of our sharing would benefit many people.
So while there will always be people who complain about a free gift or service, I've realized that all of this is to be expected anyway and in many cases, it is I who is not understood.
Overall, this experience has continued to weave an interesting dynamic into the social experiments which continue to drive Free World Dialup.
Posted by jeff at 11:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (12)
My first Yu-Gi-Oh! Tournament
Earlier today I took Dylan and Jake to their first Yu-Gi-Oh! Tournament which took place in a small mall in Maui.
The event attracted about 16 kids, mostly local from Maui except for my kids. It took about 40 minutes after we arrived for the pairing for the actual Tournament to happen with a lot of time-to-burn in between the waiting.
While everyone was waiting to start playing, the kids let each other review each other's respective decks and there were attempts at time to trade cards amongst the players.
After the pairing were announced, someone walked around to make sure that everyone's decks were up to the Tournament's rules and once they were all reviewed, the Tournament started.
Dylan and Jake lasted maybe ten minutes each and while they didn't get past the first level of the qualifying round this time, they left the tournament the experience of being part in one and the realization that it takes more than a good deck to win a match.
Posted by jeff at 02:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
December 27, 2003
Living Under the Radar...
I just continue to find it amazing that whenever most members of the mainstream media write about voice over broadband service providers, they manage to remember to write about our friends at Vonage and Skype but forget about everyone else including FWD.
On well.
It seems that being nice and doing things to promote goodwill doesn't always get noticed by the media, but I'm resigned to believe that as long as there are people who are out there who are able to take advantage of our goodwill, then it will make the "social experiment" that makes up FWD so much more the worthwhile.
Posted by jeff at 11:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Fixing a Hole: Free Calling WILL BE back soon...
In early December I started thinking about offering Free calling into the USA and Canada during the holiday season. It took a couple of weeks to make sure that everything was in place, but in the end, by leveraging a few relationships I had, before going on vacation, I thought everything was in place to enable free calling for the holiday season.
Somewhere along the way I decided to start offering free calling into additional countries and before I knew it FWD was servicing calls into 9 countries.
While the word about the promotion was slow to spread and I was getting pretty discouraged with the results of my "social experiment", I emailed my friend Avi Weiss about our activities and the next thing I knew, literally thousands upon thousands of people started signing up for FWD...and after handling tens of thousands of free calls, our "credit" with our minutes provider ran out last night and until we are able to replenish the funding in our account, the only calls that will be able to be placed that touch the phone network will be toll-free calls into: USA, UK and Netherlands.
Sorry team. ;-)
My hope is to have everything back in place sometime on Monday, December 29th (EST), Tuesday the latest. Right now the "business" part needs to be worked out in order to enable the dialing again.
My expectation is that people will be able to call their friends and family and wish them a Happy New Year! by being able to take advantage of the FWD Network.
After our free promotion is over, my hope is that some people will stay on and keep using FWD to speak to other friends and family members who are also living in an "always-on" broadband enabled world.
Happy New Year to all!
We are Fixing the Hole...
Posted by jeff at 10:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (23)
Dylan and Jake's First Yu-Gi-Oh Tournament
For the past week, ever since Dylan and Jake learned that a local toy store in Maui holds weekly Yu-Gi-Oh! card Tournament, today's Tournament has been a focal point of their obsession.
At 6:30 am today they started preparing again for today's contest.
So far I've been able to redirect some of their energy towards keeping their blog updated and my hope is that their commitment to writing something continues once we are back from our vacation.
At least their experience in today's Tournament should provide some good fodder for their future blog postings in their Yu-Gi-Oh! blog.
Posted by jeff at 12:15 PM | Permalink
I'm giving up on editing out Blog Comments...
For the longest time, I've had to deal with blog Spamm.
Now for some reason there are people using my blog as a way to communicate with other FWDers and I've given up on trying to edit out some of the more useless stream of comments as wheverever the comments gets edited out, they only gets replaced a few minutes later by more of the same.
I'll try again in the new year.
Posted by jeff at 12:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Seems like old times for FWD...
A year ago I spent the last couple of weeks of 2002 "babysitting" the FWD Network and providing direct end-user support.
At that time, it was an eye-opening experience as I learned first hand for the first time all of the problems people were having with broadband communication in their homes.
Fast forward a year later, and due the relative "success" of our free calling promotion, I've spent the better part of vacation answering direct emails with our new users trying to help people with their communication and configuration problems once again. ;-)
Some things change, some things remain the same. (3rd in a series of clichés I've experienced in the past couple of days - for the other 2 you had to be here...)
- don't cut your nose to spite your face.
- you have egg on your face.
Posted by jeff at 12:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 26, 2003
FWD: 101,000 subscribers and growing!
A couple of hours ago we hit the 100,000 subscriber mark on FWD. As of 11am EST we are at 101,009 subscribers and our daily growth has continued with more than 5,000 new subscribers a day during the past 48 hour period.
The FWD Network is current running at the outer limits of it's physical capacity and chances are that our growth during the past 2 days has only been limited by our own hardware.
We will be putting faster hardware into producution the first full week of January.
It wasn't that long ago that when getting 500 new subscribers in a day we thought that was a great thing. 5,000+ new subscribers a day is nothing short of amazing.
Posted by jeff at 11:14 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
IP Commfused: The Rise, Fall and Rise of VoIP
Since 1995 some of us have witnessed the rise of VoIP, fall of VoIP and now the rise of VoIP once again.
2004 will be a really exciting year for many of private companies inside the VoIP industry. 2004 will be the first significant window for VoIP related IPOs since 2000.
While I haven't heard any noise of any roll-ups underway inside of the IP Communications industry, I would not be surprised at all to learn of pending roll-ups in a couple of our sectors followed by an immediate IPO for the combined entities.
Looks like 2004 may be a windfall year for investment bankers focusing on the IP Communications space.
Posted by jeff at 02:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Looking for a few cool new applications...
Now that everything associated with VoIP is cool again, I'm once again looking for example applications that take advantage of IP Communication platforms and demonstrate once and for all "things that one can do with IP that just wasn't practical or possible using other technologies."
If you know of such products / solutions, please email: jeffp@pulver.com
Posted by jeff at 02:27 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 25, 2003
Dec 25 2003 Stats for Free World Dialup
Like everything else, sometimes one needs to be careful what they wish for in the case the wish comes true. ;-)
As of 12:00 PM EST on 12/25/03 during the past 24 hours, we have experienced: 5,865 new subscribers, 54,192 call attempts and 10,313 unique users on our network with a total of 95,562 subscribed.
These are all record numbers for us and not that long ago would have represented great stats for a couple of weeks on FWD rather than 24 hours of activity.
Posted by jeff at 01:07 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
The DylanJake Yu-Gi-Oh! Blog is live (sort of)
While on vacation, my kids have started posting to their own blog which is focused on providing kids of their own ages with the latest and greatest information regarding Yu-Gi-Oh! cards and related happenings in their world of Yu-Gi-Oh!
While my kids were not too keen on the concept of posting an update to their blog on a daily basis, they have made the commitment to give it a try and to at least update their blog a few times a week.
In the event they actually live up to their commitment, their blog will over time turn into a great resource for other kids who also enjoy collecting Yu-Gi-Oh! cards and competing in Yu-Gi-Oh! duels.
Posted by jeff at 03:20 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
Bezeq (and others) do not understand Free World Dialup
Yesterday I started receiving email from people who told me that Free World Dialup was covered in a story carried in Israel on Israel TV Channel 2. The story was given 3 minutes during prime viewing time and from what I was told, the story positioned FWD against the incumbent Israeli operator Bezeq. The Beqeq spokesperson didn’t have many kind words for FWD.
I guess it is stories of “us vs. them” that sells newspapers and gets viewers talking. But had Channel 2 actually contacted somebody from the FWD team, they might have learned that it is not an “us vs. them” situation. All that we are trying to do is spread some holiday cheer around the world and along the way get people to experience voice over broadband for the very first time.
Hopefully future coverage of Free World Dialup by other media will be a closer representation to our intended reality.
Posted by jeff at 03:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Free World Dialup: The word is spreading
It seems that our holiday promotion of providing free phone calls into 8 countries has started to have its intended effect.
Special thanks to everyone who is helping to spread the word.
During the past 24 hours, the FWD Network has grown by 2718 subscribers, at a time when our "average" increase was around 400 people a day.
We also experienced a significant increase in call attempts - 34,145 vs. 21,466 vs. 17,040 during the past couple of days.
Hopefully our holiday stats will continue to grow...
Posted by jeff at 02:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
December 24, 2003
7 Rainbow Day on Maui!
While today was the first day which had more clouds than sunshine, it was also the first time my kids experienced the rainbows of Hawaii and after a short while they forgot about the rain as they were mesmerized by the natural beauty associated with rainbows.
Today was a gentle reminder that sometimes it is the little things that can mean a lot.
Posted by jeff at 03:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
IPWireless - a Company to Watch in 2004
IPWireless is one of the companies on my personal watchlist to track in 2004.
I first learned about IPWireless about a year ago and have been impressed with their enabling technology platforms of TD-CDMA and their vision to support SIP and mobile VoIP on the licensed 2.5 Ghz spectrum.
It turns out that I've been using the technology of IP Wireless for the past 5 days as IP Wireless has teamed with Maui Sky Fiber to provide high-speed internet access to many parts of Maui.
I expect that IPWireless will be making significant strides in enabling mobile VoIP networks during the course of 2004 and setting the pace for others to follow.
Posted by jeff at 02:54 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 23, 2003
Providing a service much like 1-800-OK-Cable
Earlier today I started thinking about the free calling promotion that I've been doing with Free World Dialup the past week and what I realized was that what I'm promoting is the use of voice over broadband in general with the hope of getting people to try it with the expectation that once they try it, they will stick with it.
One problem with this model / analogy is that unlike the cable companies in the US which operate in their own unique regions, the FWD effort is worldwide and we are not affiliated with anyone else other than ourselves. Also, there isn't anyone else helping to subsidize my efforts yet.
So while I do hope that we will be successful to get many new people to try leveraging their use of DSL and Cable for voice communications, once they are hooked and they decide to subscribe to one of the various service providers available around the world, we have in effect, "done our job" and there is nothing yet to directly show for this. ;-)
I realize the script just isn't finished. I'm giving myself the rest of my vacation to try to figure this one out.
Posted by jeff at 10:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Maui - One Beautiful 'High-Tech' Island
Ever since my first visit to Maui back in 1981, I remember Maui to be both a magical and beautiful island. Maybe it was that drive to Hana all those years ago with my family which engrained a vision of waterfalls and curvy roads but ever since I've been coming back to Maui, it is the natural beauty of the Island that I remember more than anything.
Now I learn that Maui is actually a "high-tech" Island and is positioning itself as one.
Given that this is the first place in the USA that I've been able to take full advantage of 3GPP, I find it a little ironic that I had to fly to an Island to get a glimpse of the future of where Wireless may be going in the United States.
Posted by jeff at 02:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)
Free Calling now into: Australia, China Germany, Israel, Italy, UK
During the past week, I've been engaged in a "social experiment" with regard to Free World Dialup and my decision to offer free calling into the USA and Canada for the holiday season.
Part of this experiment is to track the viral word-of-mouth of how new people are discovering Free World Dialup and to observe the dialing and usage patterns of our community.
This experiment has now been extended to include Free calling into the following countries:
Australia, China Germany, Israel, Italy, United Kingdom.
Except for calls into the USA/Canada, it is not possible to place calls to mobile phones.
To place a call, dial: * [country code] number on Free World Dialup.
For example:
--
USA/Canada: *1
Australia: *61
China: *86
Germany: *49
Italy: *39
Israel: *972
UK: *44
--
My hope is that our promotion will help some families and friends stay in closer touch during this holiday season.
Posted by jeff at 02:23 AM | Permalink
December 22, 2003
FWD - Now up to 88,500 Subscribers...
Way back when my stated goal for 2003 was to end the year with close to 100,000 subscribers.
At the moment we have about 88,500 and with 10 days left, it will be a close call to whether or not we will make it to the magic number.
Our subscriber base continues to be about 40% US and 60% non-US with the 60% being a balance of Europe/Asia/South America/Rest of World.
We are working on a new look for Free World Dialup that I expect we will be launching sometime in January.
Posted by jeff at 02:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (26)
December 21, 2003
Reaching out to Richard Neer
After reading Richard's book, "fm: The Rise and Fall of Rock Radio" and knowing what I wanted to accomplish with pulverRadio, I realized that I would have been remiss if I didn't reach out and ask Richard for his input for how he would approach Rock Radio on the Internet in 2004 and beyond.
Hopefully I will hear back from Richard sometime soon as I continue the process of the formal re-launch of my radio station.
I still believe in Internet Radio and believe that it holds the potential to do for radio what the advent of FM did to AM radio when the FCC forced owners to leverage their radio assets back in the late 1960s.
Done properly and taking the RIAA into account, the space is still wide open for the kind of disruption that I had expected since 1995 with the advent of Progressive Networks but for the most part have not yet seen or heard.
The key to all of this is to find a sustainable business model that supports an internet-only radio property. Done properly I have to believe that there is now a chance to get there, now that many more Americans are living in Broadband enabled homes and more importantly, many more people worldwide are living in or will be living with broadband in the very near future.
Posted by jeff at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
New for 2004: The Yu-Gi-Oh! Blog
While my kids have been after me for awhile to get them their own home page, what they really wanted was to have a channel to communicate with other kids about their Yu-Gi-Oh! Card strategies.
For now the kids seem find on the idea of posting to their own blog and if they actually show the dedication to keep their blog relevant, it may be a good model for other parents to follow.
While I was interested in Ham Radio at the time I was my kid's current age, my hope is that they discover the magic of ham radio on their own time when they are ready for it.
For now, I'm planning the launch of their blog in the near future. :-)
Posted by jeff at 10:47 AM | Permalink
Discovering the Beatles...
A few weeks ago in school my kids learned about a dozen Beatles songs for their Winter Chorus recital and their interest and excitement for music of the Beatles continues.
My kids just can't get enough of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, but then again, neither could I. And even after all these years and after all the times my kids insist that we play certain songs over and over and over again, the songs still sound fresh.
Posted by jeff at 03:05 AM | Permalink
December 20, 2003
Using 3G in Maui: Maui Sky Fiber
When I decided to spend some time this month in Maui, I had no idea that I would have the opporunity to experience 3GPP @ work in the USA in the process.
While I was a little disappointed that the hotel I'm staying at in Maui is not yet broadband enabled, while I was at LAX waiting for the flight to Maui, my friend, Ken Rutkowski of KenRadio gave me a the heads up about Maui Sky Fiber.
Having spent the better part of this year enjoying the use of broadband and Wi-Fi at hotels, the thought of having to use anything else wasn't all that appealing - but given the alternative of a 26.4k dial-up connection, I figured it couldn't hurt to give 3GPP a try.
Maui Sky Fiber isn't Wi-Fi - it actually runs on licensed spectrum and leverages the 3GPP technology.
My personal jury is still out on whether this implementation of 3GPP provides a better end-user experience than Wi-Fi but I'm giving myself a week to make a decision.
Until then, I'm considering myself lucky to be one of the first people in the US to be able to experience what others may eventually be able to take advantage in the rest of the US sooner or later.
Posted by jeff at 01:58 AM | Permalink
December 19, 2003
pulverRadio – Coming back in 2004
pulverRadio was launched in 2000 and was one of my personal casualties when I closed it down during the Summer of 2002. Reading “fm: The Rise and Fall of Rock Radio” by Richard Neer has given me the inspiration to once again launch a free-form progressive rock radio station that some of us who grew up listening to Rock Radio in the 70s would be proud of.
This kind of endeavor will be an upward struggle since the business model that we will be following is yet to be designed and the yearning to put the radio station back on the air comes from the heart and soul and not necessarily from the business mind. The station itself will become a mix of both technology content and rock’n’roll and there will evolve a natural universe for both the co-exist.
One can expect pulverRadio to cover VoIP and attend our VON Conferences, and will most likely provide live coverage from the exhibit floor and stream some of the keynote sessions live on the net. The same station when not covering the evolution of IP Communications will play various flavors of Rock’n’roll ranging from what was once considered “Progressive Rock” to the kind of music one would have expected to be coming from the speakers of a radio tuned into WNEW-FM if it was still operating as the FM rock radio station it was for over 30+ years.
I’m in the early stages of staffing this endeavor, and this time around I expect the station to evolve into a place that supports the progressive open minded thinkers that helped WLIR happen back in 1971 and helped evolve the rock’n’roll voice of a generation that grew up listening to and knowing what rock radio was all about.
Posted by jeff at 11:22 AM | Permalink
December 18, 2003
VoIP Continues to make Headline News...
Six months ago it would have been amazing to wake up to more than one story in the business press which covered a related VoIP announcement.
December, 2003 will be noted in the history of communications as the time when a large number of US and now Canadian service providers announced their intentions of launching their own VoIP services in 2004.
While I think it is great to see so many established service providers announcing their VoIP strategies, my hope is that sometime soon these companies will figure out ways to compete with each other on things other than price. Otherwise most of what we end up seeing is a game of price arbitrage driven by some who can afford it in a manner similar to the way that supermarkets take advantage of "loss leaders" to get people into their stores.
Hopefully somebody will realize that with the advent of VoIP comes the opportunities to deliver a whole new set of services never before practical or possible. These kinds of services represent something I started calling "purple minutes" a couple of years ago at our VON Conferences.
I look forward to seeing purple minute services deployed during 2004.
Posted by jeff at 03:45 AM | Permalink
December 17, 2003
Take the Time to Relax and Reflect...
Every once in a while take the time to relax and reflect back on how things are and where they are going.
I've just gone thru this exercise myself during the past three days at pulver.com and it has helped provide both direction and perspective to work from as I wind down my activities in 2003 and plan for an exciting year ahead in 2004.
Time is one of those assets which you can never have too much of and it goes away just when you need it the most.
Posted by jeff at 08:36 PM | Permalink
2004: The Tipping Point for the Broadband Enabled Lifestyle
2003 has been in interesting year in a number of ways and the heavy lifting many of us did for the VoIP Industry has started to show.
Beyond VoIP, I've seen signs that at least in the US, that the broadband enabled lifestyle will come into full swing in 2004.
With each business hotel that provides high-speed broadband access and /or Wi-Fi access for their guests in their lobby there is another reason why somebody can start to rely on the infrastructure and support systems to be in place so that sometime soon it will be common place to just assume that high speed access is anywhere and everywhere.
Going into 2003 I wasn't keen about paid Hotspots since I thought they all should be free, yet at year's end I've found myself a member of a couple of different Hot Spot "clubs" and an even more pressing need to stay connected whenever I travel.
I have a great deal of respect for Starbucks for creating the virtual office environment and for leading the way for others to follow when it comes to setting up areas that just work and that encourage guests to bring their laptops with them and stay for awhile.
Looking around, it seems to me that by the end of 2004, many more people will be taking advantage of the broadband enabled lifestyle in the US, and these are not people who will be relying on GSM technologies but rather a combination of DSL and Cable Modems at home and Wi-Fi enabled hotspots when they are on the road.
Advanced GSM technologies my happen one day in the US, but don't bet against the innovative ways people will discover to take advantage of solutions which are ready "here and now."
Posted by jeff at 08:20 AM | Permalink
Packet8 / FWD Update
For those of you looking forward to being able to call to/from the Packet8 Network into/from Free World Dialup, my expecation is that this is something that will be going live in January, 2004.
Last week we were successful in our testing across our test networks. The only thing which got in the way of launching the interconnect was the holiday season and vacation schedules.
Look for an announcement between Packet8 and Free World Dialup in early, 2004!
Posted by jeff at 07:08 AM | Permalink
Our Holiday Season Gift to the FWD Community...
On Free World Dialup, go ahead and dial: *1 (area code) Number.
We have arranged to pick up the costs to allow members of the Free World Dialup community to place calls into the US and Canada for Free during the 2003 holiday season.
While the offical press release will follow later today or tomorrow, you can help out in the beta-trials of this holiday gift today.
Feel free to share the holiday spirit and cheer. :-)
Posted by jeff at 06:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (63)
December 16, 2003
A new face for pulver.com is coming...
Look for a new look for pulver.com to be launched in January, 2004.
After keeping the same look/feel for what seems like forever, I'm looking forward to our new look for 2004.
By the way, we are currently working on launching some new events in 2004 and we will be bringing back some older events that were not scheduled in 2003, including our VON Developer's Conferences.
Posted by jeff at 11:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
2004: One Exciting Road Ahead!
As I look towards 2004, I see a time when some of the vision of the IP Communications industry will finally start to become a reality. Along with this reality comes a responsibility for those concerned to figure out how to best deal with the impact of what happens when VoIP "Happens!" and others get disrupted.
2003 has been quite the year for VoIP and I am bullish for the coming year.
Posted by jeff at 02:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 15, 2003
When your “Voice” is not your own…continued
While the CNET Op-Ed piece had my name on it, it was not sent to me for final review, and was not a reflection of voice as of: December 11, 2003.
For the record, I am for all uses of VoIP and I am for the public good.
The Federal Communications Commission does have it's work cut out for itself.
When it was leaked at the December 3rd ALTS conference that the FCC plans to rule on both the Free World Dialup and AT&T petitions, I am certain it alarmed those parties which may be effected by the ruling. The perception, whether
true or not, is that the Commission would be favorable towards the FWD Petition and would deny the AT&T Petition.
Based on the questions we received last week with regard to the FWD Petition, it seems as if there are people at the FCC who may be ruling based on the technical descriptions of the services to differentiate specific policies.
But the bottom line, with what seems to be very high stakes riding on the outcome of at least one of these petitions, it is easy to see why some people may be willing to stretch available resources and become in the process overly zealous.
My concern now is that in trying to help, we may have alienated some of our advocates in government.
From my perspective, I am concerned as well. I again see the hype overtaking the industry and this will have it's own consequences down the road.
In reality, I am certain the issues being faced have rather little do with VoIP, and much more to do with the impact all the technological changes are having on the current laws.
Now is a time to consider de-regulation of communications on both a State and Federal level, and not the implementation of yet more rules and regulations.
Hopefully in the future when my name is associated with an article, it will be a reflection of my voice.
And with this life lesson learned, I know who my "friends" really are. ;-)
Posted by jeff at 07:12 AM | Permalink
December 14, 2003
My Favorite Gift for the Holiday Season...
...is the IVL TV Star.
Forget about all those other gifts -if you know anybody who has kids or for that matter anyone who loves to sing, get them the IVL TVStar.
I first discovered this product a little more than a year ago and I liked it so much that I used it as a special gift for the speakers who spoke at Spring 2003 VON. I also gave it to many of the people who dropped by pulver.com during this year and spent time with us.
This gadget has entertained my family for the past year.
It is one amazing product! What is super cool is that it has a "perfect
pitch" technology so that even if you can't sing, when you use the TVStar,
you actually sound good. Heck, even I sounded ok. ;-) It comes with two
plugs - one which you use with a USB port to download additional song from
their website. (it comes loaded with 50 starter songs) and the other plug
is the A/V plug which connects to a TV/Stereo.
I bought the product in originally disbelief and now, well I'm a believer.
If you are looking for a product that just works and won't disappoint, give the IVL TVStar a chance.
Posted by jeff at 10:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
Hot Gift for the Holidays: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Disk
Turns out one of the hottest products of this holiday season is from Mattel and is called: "Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Disk."
My kids and I have spent the better part of this morning searching the net for websites that sell the product at the list price and have the product in stock.
While there are plenty of people willing to sell their personal inventory for what seems to be double the suggested retail price, none of the outlets we have checked actually have the product in stock.
I'm not sure whether or not this Yu-Gi-Oh! craze will transend some of the hotter products of recent holiday seasons, but if it seems to be well in demand by quite a few boys in the 8-10 year old demographic.
Posted by jeff at 10:53 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)
December 13, 2003
When your “Voice” is not your own…
About a month ago, during the week of November 17th, I was approached by a group of "friends" who asked me if it would be ok to use my name on an Op-Ed piece that was going to be placed prior to the FCC VoIP Forum on December 1st. The story made reference to some comments, albeit a bit controversial that Reed Hunt made the week before at our Wi-Fi Summit in Santa Clara. Looking back, the story did not acknowledge my feelings that I’ve been blogging all along that the FCC should take some actions with regard to VoIP so that the States don’t continue down the path they have been taking to in effect create a patch quilt of telecom policy inside of the US.
Well, that was then and the Op-Ed piece never ran and I had a great experience at the FCC VoIP Hearings on December 1st and have only positive things to say about the process and the state of the VoIP Industry in the US. Two days ago, on Thursday, a good 10 days after the VoIP Hearings, to my utter surprise, CNET decided to publish the Op-Ed piece, this time with edits that make reference to the fact that the VoIP Hearings happened but left in place other anachronisms which made me feel really uncomfortable, especially since I no longer agreed with the tone of the story as it was written after my personal experiences at the FCC. I still do not know who made the edits without my permission, but I do have my suspicions. Had I known the piece was going to run after the hearings, I would have made a significant amount of edits myself and would have completely written the tone.
After sleeping on it, I think I figured out what really happened and at the moment I feel as if I’ve been used and I’m not a real happy camper about the situation.
"Welcome to Washington, D.C. Politics" is the thought that comes to my mind...
Posted by jeff at 08:51 AM | Permalink
December 12, 2003
The VoIP Tipping Point: AT&T's Entry into Consumer VoIP
Last Friday I was convinced that the week of December 1st was the best week ever for the VoIP Industry and I shared these feelings with CNET a week ago.
Last night I couldn't help but notice that both the NBC and ABC networks ran a VoIP story on their national nightly news program, and this was on top of coverage by CNBC and a host of other local TV stations around the country.
While the VoIP industry had been covered in the past by the major TV networks, I don't remember a day when it was coveraged in parallel by so many news outlets at the same time.
It seems that the same kind of "irrational exuberance" that has been driving the VoIP stocks during the past month now affected the media and their coverage of consumer VoIP services.
This week has seen the news announcements from: Time Warner, Quest and AT&T with regard to their planned launch of consumer VoIP services.
AT&T may have chosen today to announce their services as a late-minute attempt to rally the FCC in not acting fast on the petition they filed a year ago with regard to the treatment of VoIP access charges. (Rumors circulating the VoIP industry are that the FCC will rule against the AT&T Petition prior to the issuance of the VoIP NPRM in February.)
But regardless of the reasoning and rationale, the fact remains that this week, the week of December 8th may in fact be the most memorable week for the VoIP industry, ever, and this month, December, 2003 will be known in our history as the month that consumer VoIP happened in the USA.
Posted by jeff at 12:31 AM | Permalink
December 11, 2003
CellSocket starting to get noticed
The CellSocket was "discovered" by the Wall Street Journal last Wednesday. Being one of the investors in WHP Wireless, and co-founder, it was great to see Walt Mossberg to take the lead and introduce the Cellsocket to the readers of the WSJ.
This "discovery" took place well after WHP Wireless sold over 40,000 CellSockets to owners of Nokia phones and at a time when they are launching their CellSocket for owners of Motorola phones.
As the wireless revolution continues to go forward and as record numbers of people continue to give up their fixed-line numbers and rely on the use of their cell phones, the CellSocket is the kind of accessory product that it well poised to service the needs of consumers who wish to power their home phone wiring with a cell phone.
Posted by jeff at 08:07 AM | Permalink
December 10, 2003
Free World Dialup / Packet8 Interconnect Progress
During the past year, Free World Dialup has put in place interconnection / peering relationships with over 40 IP Communication Service Providers around the world.
In many cases we are dealing with start-ups communication companies in their respective countries, and the peering relationships enable people from one network to communicate with friends/family who are members of the other network.
One of the first networks we tried to formally interconnect with was Packet8, but due to some technical issues on their supplied customer devices, it didn't make much sense to push forward an interconnection at that time.
But with the advent of a new software release for their DTA devices, which amongst other things now supports G.711, we were able to successfully test our interconnection yesterday between the FWD Network and the Packet8 test network.
It is my hope that in the very near future that we will be able to share traffic between our respective production networks.
Posted by jeff at 08:30 AM | Permalink
December 09, 2003
Broadband Parasites on the Rise
Back in July, I wrote about a the Rise of the Broadband Parasite and several months later, it looks as if what was suggested is starting to ring true.
In the past couple of weeks in the United States, SBC, Verizon and Qwest all announced their plans to roll out VoIP related services to both Enterprises and in some cases consumers. Outside of the US, it was just a matter of time before the PTTs announced their own broadband voice strategies.
In fact, BT just announced their "Broadband Voice" service and are targeting subscribers to Telewest and NTL.
Look for PTTs from other European captials to start to unleash their own versions of similar services over the first half of 2004.
Posted by jeff at 07:56 AM | Permalink
December 08, 2003
Reading the Tea Leaves of the Regulators
It is going to be very difficult to figure out what the regulators in Washington, DC are going to do, even those whose rhetoric is all about the benefits of VoIP.
Just a quick listen to the reports last week that were coming from Washington, DC that Chairman Powell is considering to throw phone-to-phone to the wolves now, (at least the way it is described in the AT&T petition) rather than using it as leverage to get a better overall deal.
If your business may be effected by such a regulatory approach, you may want to consider reaching out today to Bruce Jacobs of the VON Coalition and asking what you can do to help.
Posted by jeff at 06:53 AM | Permalink
Why can we be friends?
There are quite a few encouraging signs that after so much time that members of the IP Communications Industry are ready to start to work together on policy issues.
Personally I was very encouraged when I heard that members outside of the VON Coalition had signed on to both Tom Eveslin's testimony last Monday at the FCC and/or signed onto the NENA agreement...but the need exists to make much more progress as regulators tackle the
tough issues of how to deal with VoIP as a more mainstream technology.
Posted by jeff at 06:44 AM | Permalink
December 07, 2003
FCC May be Ruling on the Free World Dialup & AT&T Petitions
As a follow-up to discussions from the FCC's VoIP Forum last week, it now seems as if the FCC is poised to rule on both the Free World Dialup and the AT&T petitions over the next few weeks and at a time before they issue their VoIP Notice for Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) in what is expected to be the February, 2004 timeframe.
Last week the FCC reached out to the Free World Dialup legal team for clarification of some of the arguments raised in our petition and it is my understanding that they also taking a hard look at the merits of the AT&T Petition.
Some members of the industry feel that this relatively quick turnaround means that the AT&T Petition may be denied and that the FWD Petition may be accepted. It is hard to read the tea leaves on this one but I can assure you that AT&T will leave no leaf unturned trying to covey the importance of not having their petition denied.
What many people don't realize is that the FWD petition attempts to lay the groundwork for what I believe is the future of communications insomuch when such communications engages in what is known as "end-to-end IP" and where the call doesn't "touch" the traditional public switched telephone network.
A positive ruling for FWD could be a great step forward for the future evolution of broadband voice communications.
Posted by jeff at 07:45 AM | Permalink
December 06, 2003
Avoid Hotel Room #411...
...if that hotel has a 3 digit dialing plan supported and I'm staying at the same hotel.
Early this morning I woke up whoever was staying in room 411 when I was half-awake and tried to dial what I thought was directory assistance to get the local Air Canada phone number.
Hopefully this doesn't happen to everyone who stays in that room...
Posted by jeff at 08:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Me and Nicky Sixx (from Motley Crue)
After the NYSSA event on Wednesday I took a flight to Toronto with the intent to spend only a couple of nights in Toronto.
Wednesday night in Toronto I ended up going to a steakhouse called Barristers with a group of people. When we were seated, we were right near a table making a lot of noise and it looked like there was familiar face at that table, but it wasn't until we asked one of the waiters, "who it was?" did a person in my party say together with the waiter that it was Nicky Sixx, the bass player from Motley Crue.
Thursday night I ended up going out to another steak house in Toronto and this time I ended up at one of The Keg restaurants in town and while I was waiting for some of my guests to arrive, who do I see being interviewed in Keg's in-house studio but none other than Nicky Sixx.
Still not sure what the connection was but...
Yesterday morning at the Toronto airport going thru the magazine section I couldn't hope but notice that Nicky Sixx was on the cover of the December/Holiday issue of the Canadian issue of Hustler Magazine...so to remember this trip I bought the issue and ripped off the cover and placed it into my travel bag.
A few minutes later while waiting at the gate for the plane who do I see but Nicky Six once again, this time in person so I had him autograph the magazine cover. Minutes after that, I end up sitting across from him on the flight back to New York.
I'm still not sure what the mystical connection between the two of us may be, but this is another of a long list of interesting coincidences which seem at times to be too much of a coincidence to ignore.
[written - on the AC flight 706 on Dec 5, 2003 - 12:27 pm.]
At about 12:30 pm the pilot of flight 706 announced that we were circling with 36 other planes trying to land in LGA and that the airport had just been closed. We turned around and flew back to Toronto!
Getting off the plane down the walkway, Nicky Sixx sees me and asks me: "Are you stalking me?"
Bizarre! And did I say Blizzard?
During the next hour of trying to reroute / reschedule my return flight I ended up having him in front of me in line two more times.
One question I never did get an answer about was what happened to my frequent flyer miles, given that we literally flew to LGA airspace, then flew back to Toronto and in the process the flight was cancelled. In the Air Canada computer the flight never happened. ;-(
In the process I ended up discovering yet another broadband enabled hotel in downtown Toronto.
Turns out that Toronto's chilly weather is pretty ok given that the metro NYC area is under a "blizzard forecast" at the moment.
Looks like I will be writing the next Pulver Report from Toronto over this weekend.
Posted by jeff at 08:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 05, 2003
Add The Sheraton Centre Toronto to the...
...list of hotels that "get it" with respect to Wi-Fi.
The Sheraton Centre hotel in downtown Toronto offers guests who visit their hotel free Wi-Fi in several "Bell AccessZone"(s) around the hotel, including the hotel lobby that on any given aftertoon can resemble the inside of a US Starbucks with a Hotspot more than just about anything else.
In fact, in a quick Wi-Fi survey at the hotel, one could find people taking advantage of the free Wi-Fi in just about all of the published areas that Wi-Fi was being provided.
My hope is that the Sheraton experiment of 2003 will continue into 2004 and that future guests will be able to continue to rely on the widespread availability of free Wi-Fi access and in fact that more Bell AccessZones start to appear throughout Canada.
Posted by jeff at 06:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)
December 04, 2003
FCC may take action on FWD Petition soon...
...or so I thought.
Shortly after speaking at the NYSSA VoIP event in NYC yesterday, I received a phone call from Howard Buskirk, a reporter from Telecommunications Reports who was attending the ALTS Panel Discussion on VoIP yesterday in Washington, D.C., whose take away from that meeting is that the FCC may rule on both the Free World Dialup Petition and the AT&T Petitions prior to the FCC's issuance of their NPRM in Feburary.
When I heard this I thought this could possibly be great news for FWD and the future since it may clear the path for a clear ruling on the future regulatory treatment of "end-to-end IP."
That was yesterday. This morning, looking back, while it would great if the FCC could rule in front of the NPRM, it is also possible that all that may happen is the FCC may release a short Order with their VoIP NPRM, but all that the Order may only go so far as to reach the jurisdictional question posed by the Vonage Petition (i.e., preempt the state and state clearly that the FCC intends to subsume the field on VoIP issues) and nothing more.
On the plus side, my hope is that with the advent of the FCC taking some action that the States will change their approach to the regulatory treatment of VoIP and in effect will wait for the FCC to rule in this space.
Stay Tuned...
Posted by jeff at 07:29 AM | Permalink
December 03, 2003
Presentation at NYSSA Today
Back in August when the New York State Society of Security Analysts started planning for VoIP event today, they had no idea that this week would be the most visable week of the year for the VoIP Industry.
I'm headed there this morning to give one of the industry perspectives in the opening panel. My talk will give a quick snapshot of where I see things are today as well as include a recap of my recent FCC testimony from the VoIP Forum on Monday.
The timing of the NYSSA event couldn't be better and given the recent mini-bubble in the pure-play VoIP stocks and the current adjustment in place, the messages heard today should help provide short-term comfort / direction for where the industry may be headed.
From my side, assuming the sector stays hot, I expect to sell some roll-ups happening by-mid to late 2004, followed by one or two "poof" IPOs.
In addition, some of the pre-2001 surviving pure-play VoIP companies should start to line-up and get ready to go public by late 2004, early 2005...and sooner if market conditions permit.
Posted by jeff at 05:53 AM | Permalink
December 02, 2003
Skype Hype Continues...
Our friends in Sweden continue to ride the new wave of IP Communications to new heights.
As mentioned in Red Herring, Skype recently closed on their first formal venture round.
While I'm sure some would be interested in learning what the pre-money valuation was on Skype, one thing is for certain: when the book is written on the viral marketing of real-time communication networks, it will be written by the co-founders of Skype! :-)
Congrats to the Skype Team for what they have accomplished in such a relative short time.
Posted by jeff at 11:29 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)
Regulate with a "light touch" if at all...
I left Washington, D.C. feeling a lot more comfortable about the near term future of the IP Communications Industry in the US.
I believe the FCC VoIP Forum was quite the success and the amount of people who were present in the room during the testimony and panel discussions coupled with the number of people overflowing from the FCC's overflow rooms was just one more indication of the high level of interest within the Beltway of the near term future of IP Communications in the USA.
Speaking with some FCC staffers after the meeting, it came out that the earliest they expect to see the FCC's NPRM, Notice of Proposed Rule Making on Internet Telephony, was February 2004.
I've been reading some of the news stories which originated from the hearings and one thing which I found interesting is that the Reuters story quotes the testimony from my blog rather than from what I actually said.
Right before I spoke I made some last minute edits where I took out the statement, "IP Communications has no bottlenecks" which was noticeable only if you compared my live testimony against the written words of what I posted as my proposed testimony.
I guess Carl was right that his point was a great soundbyte. ;-)
Posted by jeff at 06:50 AM | Permalink
December 01, 2003
Great Day in Washington, D.C.
Just got back home from spending the day in Washington, DC at the FCC's VoIP Forum.
From my perspective, today was a great day. I believe the VoIP Forum as the FCC was a great success and provided an opportunity to create and open dialog between the FCC and members of the IP Communications industry.
As evidenced by the significant media attention given to this event, including the live C-SPAN coverage, the discussions from today will have a positive impact in the near-term future of the IP Communications industry.
I'm told to look out for the NPRM from the FCC as soon as February, 2004.
Next up for me is a presenation on Wednesday at the New York State Society of Security Analysts (NYSSA)'s VoIP Forum.
Posted by jeff at 11:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)
FCC VoIP Forum starts in a few hours...
stay tuned.
Given the recent attention that IP Communications has had in the US in both the financial markets and general consumer press, it will be real interesting to listen to the specific words of what is said today and how that affects both overall investor setiment as well as the mood of the near-term future of the IP Communications Industry.
With all of the natural attention coming into the sector, now is the chance for the industry to shine and in the process, clearly demonstrate how different IP Communications is than the legacy of traditional telecommunications it is destined to replace.
Posted by jeff at 07:08 AM | Permalink
My Testimony at the FCC VoIP Forum: Panel I - Dec 1, 2003
The following are my planned remarks for panel I of the FCC VoIP Forum taking place later today at the FCC in Washington, D.C.
Good morning. Thank you for inviting me.
I want to start by saying that I do not have a telecom background. But as Paul Simon wrote, “my lack of education has not hurt me none”. Thanks to IP Communications, my limits are only my imagination.
My involvement in the emerging IP Communications Industry started in ‘95. In the Seventies, as a ham radio operator, I spent some time running phone patches for military personnel overseas. In ‘95, I started experimenting at night with the same kind of phone patch, this time using the Internet instead of amateur radio. I called it “Free World Dialup.” Coming from my ham radio background, I just wanted to use technology to talk to people around the world and help others do the same. That’s one reason I don’t use the term “Internet Telephony” since I think it limits people’s perception. I like to talk about “IP Communications,” since VoIP is and can be so much more than just plain old telephone service.
A little more than a year ago, I took another look at where voice over broadband was going and decided to launch FWD once again, this time as a peer-to-peer network over broadband. Today, we have over 80,000 users worldwide, whom we serve with just a few Linux servers in New York. Our users connect using a variety of products including: PDAs, PCs, IP Phones and devices that enable the use of analog phones. The form factor of a phone is not a good basis for regulation. IP Communications has evolved past the distinctions made in the Stevens Report.
More than half of the members of Free World Dialup are from outside the US. Their physical location is unimportant, because the voice part of the call goes between the end points. On the Internet, distance doesn’t matter and the source and destination of a call is not fixed. Our service runs more like a domain registry than a phone network. Our network is home to a very imaginative community who are using it in a variety of ways, including the use of a directory with status information about when people are available to communicate. This status information, known as presence, can appear on web pages, e-mails, and other visual displays to track friends and help complete calls.
One place we use presence is our welcome line, which is associated with many volunteers. If you dial “55555” on Free World Dialup, the phone number rings in potentially 25 cities/locations around the world and is answered by whomever answers first. I can imagine an emergency service that listed medical experts like our welcome line does and offers the ability to have medical experts on worldwide call.
Some community members provide value to FWD by offering free connectivity to the public phone network. FWD Community members can also engage in their own independent service creation. This ability is much different that the traditional way of deploying new services on the Public phone network.
With IP Communications, applications and services are separate from transport. I would like to point out, that nothing is stopping the ILECs and Cable companies from also offering their own hosted voice over broadband services. In the future, you can expect competition to come from broadband service providers outside the US.
We are migrating voice away from a service dependent on service providers; we are coming to a time when voice will work like e-mail. Many people get e-mail from service providers, but many also provide their own email service as either enterprises or end users. More importantly, they can access their email from anywhere and we should expect the same for voice.
In contrast, most of this would not be possible using today’s circuit-switched technology. IP Communications is happening everywhere as shown by the use of IP Phones with General Tommy Franks during the war in Iraq. In fact, IP Communications is being used today in Government, the Military, Education, by Consumers, and just about every business sector. And IP Communications is not just about Voice, as is evidenced by the deployment of Instant Messaging with Internet Cameras. Free World Dialup, and “messenger services” from AOL, Microsoft and Yahoo! enable people to communicate via text, voice and video with several people at the same time. Even internet gaming technology like X-box Live! has the ability to communicate between gamers and further blurs the line.
These days it is commonplace to take advantage of 3rd party call controls on web pages to setup conference calls and engage in collaborative conferences, which take advantage of sharing PowerPoint applications, voice and video.
Attention has been paid to the social policy issues raised by VoIP. These are solvable in the sense that applications can be developed to provide disability access and access to emergency services and law enforcement. Producing the IP Communication Industry’s Trade show, VON, I can tell you that we have continually focused on the requirements to support PSTN solutions, but until recently, the PSTN community has not been focused on VoIP.
I believe that we have sufficient attention now, to enable voluntary standards to be developed. The VON Coalition has just worked out an agreement with NENA that provides a short-term and long-term approach to providing 9-1-1 access to users of IP communications. I encourage you to give these voluntary approaches time to work. What you shouldn’t do is just dump legacy regulation on what is a fundamentally different technology. This is NOT traditional telecommunications. IP Communications has no bottlenecks. And keep in mind the potential of IP Communications to exceed what today’s telephony provides. For instance, one major reason the Dept of Commerce deployed VoIP for its internal voice system is its ability to provide “reverse 9-1-1”, alerting employees when there’s an emergency.
I also encourage you not to assume that VoIP is going to take over the world of communications tomorrow. The reality of the marketplace is not being reflected in the press.
VoIP penetration is totally dependent on broadband adoption and the consumer’s comfort with the environment. And challenges still exist.
My hope is that you leave room for IP Communications to continue to innovate and experiment. If there is regulation, it should be smart regulation that takes into account interconnection between Internet - based phone carriers and has phone – to - phone calls that never touch the PSTN. It is fine to consider IP Communications when looking at the requirements for the public good; I think the focus should be on how to enable a broadband “always-on” public network that gently migrates people from the PSTN.
In closing, if you do not believe in the innovation possible with IP Communications, you can surely destroy it by forcing regulation. If you want to see “a duck” then all your “flowers are red”, you will miss the opportunity to see all the “colors in the flower.”
Thank you for your time. Thank you for the future.
Testimony from Jeff Pulver, pulver.com, jeffp@pulver.com - FCC VoIP Forum – December 1, 2003
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