Posted 11/18/09 at 04:38:56 PM by Bart Salisbury

Michael Arrington, of TechCrunch, is not giving up. Google, according to him, is readying to release its own Android phone. Google says no. IntoMobile, Daring Fireball, and PC World all say no. But Arrington still says yes.

Why? Because Google’s Andy Rubin said there will be no Google phone. That’d seem pretty conclusive, despite the practice of companies’ denying the existence of a product until the product actually ships. But there’s a loophole here that Arrington sniffs out. And it has to do with with the simple question: when is a phone not a phone?

Answer: when it’s a data device. Arrington suspects the focus on a phone as a phone is where others have it wrong. After all, a data device is capable of carrying voice over VoIP. Which makes any computer equipped with Skype, for example, a phone while not being a phone. Arrington points out that Google even said as much when it was bidding for chunks of the 700 Mhz spectrum back in 2007.

Arrington says his sources tell him AT&T is bidding on a service. Google would make block purchases of data from AT&T, and will sell access to purchasers of its data device. Conditions will apply, Arrington suspects, as the target price is $20 a month. He also suggests that U.S. GSM carriers, as well as TMobile, could support the device.

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Posted 11/06/09 at 08:27:58 PM by Ryan Whitwam

It looks like you can expect Skype to continue functioning as normal. A settlement has finally been reached with the parties, including eBay and Skype founders, Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis. The legal battle started when eBay agreed to sell a 65% stake in Skype to Silver Lake Partners on September 1st. The founders sued, claiming that eBay was engaging in copyright infringement. As it turns out, eBay never actually owned the core technology behind Skype, called Global Index.

According to the settlement, Zennström and Friis, will join the investor group that is purchasing Skype. They will contribute software from their new venture, Joltid. In return, they will receive a 14% stake in Skype. When the sale is completed, eBay will be paid a cool $1.9 billion. Though, this is much less than the original purchase price for Skype. Though, the online auction house will also retain 30% of Skype.

Getting all the technology under one roof again should settle the issue of Skype’s intellectual property once and for all. Do you use Skype on a regular basis? Were you worried about its future?

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Posted 11/03/09 at 02:55:02 PM by Bart Salisbury

It didn’t take long for the other technological shoe to drop. Ribbit has hopped out a beta for Ribbit Mobile, a direct VoIP challenge to Google Voice. And one, by the looks of it, that just might fuel a VoIP arms race.

Ribbit Mobile is a cloud-based VoIP telephony service. Much the same as Google Voice, you get a phone number to which you can route your phones capable of conditional call-forwarding. Once there Ribbit Mobile can do everything Google Voice does with a call. But it doesn’t stop there. Ribbit Mobile also offers a nifty feature set not yet available in Google Voice. For example, Ribbit Mobile can route your call to any or all other phones you choose, or to Skype, MSN Messenger, or Google Talk. Ribbit Mobile can also alert you to missed calls via email, Skype, Google Talk, or SMS. And Ribbit Mobile has widgets which allow you to connect with iGoogle, Facebook, and MySpace. Best of all you can place calls directly from your browser.

Ribbit Mobile will be offered in two levels. One will be free, with services like voicemail transcription automated. The other, a professional level, will be fee-based, and will come with additional support. Currently, both levels are in beta. Sign-up for the beta is on-going.

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Posted 10/29/09 at 03:09:40 PM by Bart Salisbury

It seemed liked a good idea at the time, Google’s got to be thinking right about now. The good idea is Google Voice, which allows users a whole lot of nifty features for making and managing phone calls. For some, such as AT&T, however, Google Voice is a bad idea because Google Voice gets to play by a different set of rules which allow it to invade AT&T’s turf, and undercut its revenue stream.

One of the headaches Google Voice has generated for its parent company is the result of blocking calls to certain numbers. It costs to make calls, and the costs are greater to rural carriers, conference call services, and adult-themed entertainment. The rules for telephone company’s say all call get to pass through. Google Voice counters it is not a telephone company so doesn’t have to play by those rules.

In defending Google Voice’s decision to block calls, Richard Whitt, Google’s telecom and media counsel, tells us: “Earlier this year, we noticed an extremely high number of calls were being made to an extremely small number of destinations. In fact, the top 10 telephone prefixes--the area code plus the first three digits of a seven digit number, e.g., 555-555-XXXX--generated more than 160 times the expected traffic volumes, and accounted for a whopping 26 percent of our monthly connection costs.” Google, one can appreciate, doesn’t see a particular need to subsidize the fantasies of middle-aged single men still living in their mothers’ basements.

Google is promising to implement blocking schemes that are more particular--targeting particular numbers rather than a whole exchange. And, in fact, feels it should be congratulated for exposing “traffic pumping schemes” that drive up the cost of ordinary phone service. I’m guessing AT&T won’t be the first to send flowers.

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Posted 10/27/09 at 03:04:04 PM by Bart Salisbury

Thinking of going global? It just got a little easier. Voxbone, a Bussells-based provider of international VoIP origination services and telephone numbers will announce tomorrow its global phone number service, iNum, will support high-definition voice calling among VoIP networks, including Skype.

A global phone number is like one assigned by Google Voice: yours to keep wherever you choose to wander. Global numbers came into being when the International Telephone Union (ITU) created the 883 code, which refers to the Internet rather than a country. When the 883 code is used Voxbone gets your call, routes it to the nearest Internet Service Provider (ISP), then disconnects itself so you can use the lower cost service.

The quality of your call depends on the codec used. Skype uses the SILK super wideband audio codec. Voxbone will instead use the HD wideband codec G.722. Voxbone will provide the necessary transcoding. And it plans to offer transcoding for additional codecs in the future.

How big a deal this is depends on who you ask. Robin Wauters of TechCrunch writes: “We should note there is some industry criticism around the concept of ‘HD calling’, which at times gets billed as a fancy new term that doesn’t describe anything earth-shatteringly new or innovative and something which there is no demand for.”

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Posted 10/19/09 at 01:56:55 PM by Paul Lilly

Lenovo has let it be known that every single ThinkPad laptop and ThinkCentre desktop PC will come with Skype already installed.

"If you're fortunate enough to get your hands on a Lenovo ThinkPad or ThinkCentre for your home or office, be sure to keep an eye out for Skype," said Peter Parkes, Skype's chief blogger.

That's great news for private equity firm Silver Lake Partners, who bought a 65 percent share of the company last month and would like nothing more than to see Skype's market share continue to grow. While terms of the Lenovo deal have not been disclosed, there's a reason why software companies pay tidy sums to have their apps come pre-installed on OEM systems.

As for consumers, you can view it as another piece of bloatware to be nuked after first firing up your new PC, or a handy pre-install of an app you may already use anyway.

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Posted 10/07/09 at 04:23:05 PM by Jason Barry

AT&T announced today that they’ll be enabling the use of VOIP on their 3G network specifically for the iPhone. Skype was extremely excited to hear the news given that 10% of all iPhone and iPod touch users have downloaded the Skype application.

The announcement was initially released by AT&T in an FCC filing, soon to be published, explaining that they will open their 3G network to internet calling applications, including Skype.

It should be interesting to see where this leaves the much debated Google Voice application, rejected from the Apple App store earlier this year. While AT&T’s decision isn’t as sustainable as a government policy, it should put significant pressure on other carriers to allow similar network access.

You can find a PDF of the filing here, as well as a link to the AT&T press release.

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Posted 10/06/09 at 11:05:07 AM by Paul Lilly

Some of the calls you make to landlines via Skype will soon be free. That's because after testing its click-to-call ads on the Web for several months, Skype today announced it is rolling out the new business-funded product in a partnership with European Directories.

"Partnering with European Directories is a key part of bringing our new business funded click-to-call product to market and providing advertisers with solutions that can help them connect with customers in new and innovative ways," said Don Albert, GM and VP of Americas and Advertising for Skype. "When a call is free and only one click away, we believe it can have a positive impact for a business because there are fewer barriers to start a call. That can result in more qualified leads, more engagement, and possibly a higher rate of conversion for a business."

Calls that are funded by a business will be highlighted with a blue "Free Call" button that appears anywhere online where a phone number is displayed, Skype explained. This includes search engines, internet yellow pages, and local search sites.

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