Alec Saunders SquawkBox

Alec’s away for the next few weeks and so we have the perfect opportunity to crack Canadian jokes and comment about Alec having a very large TV so that he can watch hockey…

Seriously, though, here are the links for the shows this week that I’ll be hosting this week in Alec’s absence. I’m working on lining up some interesting guests and in the meantime we’ll also have our regular tech conversations that have always seemed to go well. (FYI, if you or someone you know would like to be a special guest either this week or next, please do let me know.)

I’m particular excited about our show on Tuesday, July 1st, where we’ll have author and researcher Jonathan Zittrain on our show. I’ve started reading his new book, “The Future of the Internet - And How to Stop It“, and I have to say that so far it strikes at the core of what we’ve talked about frequently on the show… the move from “walled gardens” to open networks and now the frightening potential re-emergence of walled gardens and proprietary “lock-in” business models. More information about the book - and video of Jonathan Zittrain - can be found on: http://futureoftheinternet.org/

As has been the practice, here are the URLs for the shows this week - I’m looking forward to seeing many of you on the calls:

MONDAY - JUNE 30th - Discussion of Microsoft after Bill Gates and Steve Gillmor’s view on the subject, as well as Google’s move to help academia move into cloud computing: http://apps.facebook.com/calliflower/conf/show/34158

TUESDAY - JULY 1st - Jonathan Zittrain interview:
http://apps.facebook.com/calliflower/conf/show/32045

WEDNESDAY - JULY 2nd:
http://apps.facebook.com/calliflower/conf/show/34159

THURSDAY - JULY 3rd:
http://apps.facebook.com/calliflower/conf/show/34160

FRIDAY - JULY 4th - There will be no call.

I look forward to seeing many of you on the calls this week.

Dan

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

Today we wrapped up some of the big stories of the week.

We started with iPhone.  The rumors are still rolling strong.  For instance, iTunes 7.7 reputedly has code allowing a remote control app for iPhone / iPod Touch in it that will let you access iTunes from anywhere in your home.  And apparently iPhone will also have… gasp… MMS!    Nearly 7 million searches for iPhone were conducted on the web in April.  The hype machine is in overdrive as we come up on July 11.

Some people are saying that Apple is getting a bye.  That other phones have better capabilities and they’re being swept aside in the wave of Apple hype.  We discussed, debated, and got to the bottom of it.  Apple’s virtue is simplicity and browsing.  Some of us are going to buy iPhone 3G.  But none are planning to give up stalwarts like the BlackBerry or any of the Nokia phones.

And then we talked about Nokia’s N78 for North America announcement.  Now available in North America with North American 3G.  Huzzah! Several of us had seen the phone, and we had a lengthy discussion about the improved GPS.

BlackBerry’s gains, Palm’s losses — Palm recorded a larger than expected loss, and their shares fell 3.4per cent.  One analyst said that the Treo has fallen off a cliff.  But Blackberry, who grew share from 35.1 percent to 44.5 percent and had great revenues, but missed the street by a penny saw their shares PUNISHED with a 9 percent drop.  Palm craters, their stock goes down 3.4.  RIM smacks the ball out of the park and gets reward with a 9 percent drop.

According to Jim Courtney, RIM met guidance.  They missed the consensus estimate, which was above guidance, and that’s why the stock dropped.  A case of over-eager analysts projecting too high, rather than any failure on RIM’s part. I’m sure their reduced guidance for fourth quarter had an impact too.

Jajah’s new deal with Gizmo5 was seen as a blow to Level3.

What about Microsoft partner Intel’s decision not to deploy Windows Vista?  They said there was nothing wrong with it… but they couldn’t see the business benefit. There were several snickers on the line, and the observation that some corporate applications just don’t run on a Vista machine.

And Nokia’s moves with Symbian.  Well, this really remains to be played out.

On the call: Dameon Welch-Abernathy, Hudson Barton, Jim Courtney, Ari Rabban, Ian Hood, Bill Volk, James Body, Jonathan Jensen, Sheryl Breuker

In SquawkBox News: we’re moving to an abbreviated summer schedule.  Shows will still be recorded daily, but Monday through Thursday.  AND, for the next three weeks, enjoy our guest hosts, including Dan York, Carl Ford, and David Spark.

 

 Squawk Box June 27 [39:00m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Jon Arnold subbed for me today, interviewing Jazinga co-founder Shidan Gouran.  Jazinga’s combination WiFi router / PBX promises to be one of the more revolutionary SMB telephony devices to hit the market in years.

No doubt there’s a lot of interest in the product.  22 people joined the call including Larry Greenfield, Steve Lecomte, Dan York, Arshad Merali, Carl Ford, Jim Courtney, Moshe Maeir, Jeb Brilliant, Ian Hood, Bill Volk, James Body, Frank Abrams, Cliff Flood, Nabeel Jafferali and Adam Austin.

 

 Squawk Box June 26 [40:15m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Image via Wikipedia

In Telerupted: Twilight for Telephone Networks, Daniel Berninger projects that at some point VoIP networks will connect more individuals than the PSTN, and then asks what might happen to current minutes based VoIP businesses. These businesses depend on charging for access to the VoIP network via the PSTN or vice versa.  Moreover, the artificial constraints that this dependency imposes are real and substantial.  Daniel writes:

Companies that depend on the telephone network inherit of a range of artificial constraints. VoIP devices connected via the telephone network lose the prospect of delivering high-quality audio. Traditional telephones do not support the use of domain names for routing or hyperlinking. Global flat-rate termination that serves as a driving force for applications of the Internet get sacrificed. Embracing the telephone network postpones the search for new forms of communication.

We live in interesting times in the telecom industry.  Recently, I saw a presentation from a VoIP telco showing a great growth curve for a number of quarters followed by a flat period. After multiple quarters it suggested that in some markets mere POTS replacement has reached the point of saturation.  Now this service provider, like the incumbents, is out looking for value added services to add to its portfolio.

Disruptive pricing can only disrupt for so long, it seems.  At some point, that advantage can be erased, returning the basis of competition to service, products and features.

Image via Wikipedia

You may recall a few weeks ago that JAJAH announced that they had won Yahoo’s call termination business. Essentially, Yahoo outsourced their network to JAJAH.  That’s a great deal for JAJAH.

This morning they’ve done it again, announcing a relationship with Michael Robertson’s Gizmo5.  In essence, Gizmo5 will do the same deal with JAJAH as Yahoo! did.  JAJAH gets millions of new customers, and Gizmo5 gets a reliable and more cost effective infrastructure.  It might tempt me to try Gizmo5 again.

Said Gizmo5 President Jason Droege, ““The JAJAH platform was chosen because of the simplicity of implementation, reliability and the ability to expand our software globally.  With Gizmo5 leveraging the JAJAH platform, we have the ability to break into the huge untapped market for VoIP. Because this partnership brings together simple telephony, innovation and quality for the masses, we aim to reach the ninety percent of Internet users who don’t currently use VoIP.”

JAJAH has been successful at scooping up some of the smaller players with their JAJAH managed services platform.  Does anyone want to take bets on whether they can land one of the big fish?  How about Skype?