Alec Saunders SquawkBox

This morning we talked with Voxbone CEO Rod Ullens about the launch of their iNum service that provides a single country agnostic number under the +883 country code. An iNum number takes advantage of Voxbone’s IP-based intercontinental network such that calls from any location worldwide are either free or at a very low cost.

Rod spent some time outlining the key features and benefits of the service, how calls are made and the general rollout plans for this service. Spokespersons from four iNum Service Provider Partners - Voxeo, Mobivox, Truphone and OnState discussed how they will be using the service and their rollout plans. Of course, iotum’s CalliFlower will also announce  Wednesday their implementation of Voxbone’s service for access to Calliflower conference calls such as this one.

On the Calliflower Conference Call today: Jim Courtney (Moderator), Dan York, Kevin Baggs, Jeb Brilliant, Sheryl Breuker, Tom Carter, Luca Filigheddu, Carl Ford, Jason Harris, Brad Jones, Pat Kelly, William Volk, Peter Diedrich, Larry Lisser, Nabeel Jafferi, Sergio Meinardi.

 

 Squawk Box November 11 [30:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

iNum is the world’s first global telephone number standard.  Sanctioned by the ITU, it’s a global phone number beginning with the +883 prefix.  Essentially, it allows any business to establish a global presence at low or no cost to the calling party.  Think of it as an 800 number for the world.

VoxBone has announced that they’re rolling out the first iNum services today.  Wholesale carriers Arbinet, Belgacom ICS, Level 3 Communications and Stealth’s Voice Peering Fabric have all signed up to route +883 numbers.  Service providers including Jajah, Mobivox, Gizmo5, Ribbit, Rebtel, Voipbuster, Voxeo, Voipuser and we at iotum, have also signed up to use it.

What this means for Calliflower users is that you will be able to dial into a Calliflower conference call from anywhere in the world via our +883 number using services like Gizmo5, Mobivox, Jajah, and so on.  Stay tuned for more on that shortly.

Join Jim Courtney at 11 AM EST today to chat with VoxBone CEO Rod Ullens about this topic on the SquawkBox.

On Friday, before leaving for San Francisco and the Under the Radar conference, my business partner Howard made a call to Rogers to inquire about US roaming rates for his iPhone.  The good news?  You can buy roaming voice minutes from Rogers.  And, they’ve recently reduced their data roaming charges as well.  How much you ask?  Well, the friendly CSR who answered Howard’s call provided the answer:

“How much data are you likely to consume on your trip, Sir?”, she asked.

“I don’t know”, said Howard.  “How much would a gigabyte cost?”

“Umm….”, came the reply “$6,000.  Let me just double check that for you.  (pause) yes sir, it actually is $6,000″.

For what?  So that AT&T and Rogers can exchange billing records?

Now you know why I’m no fan of locked mobile phones.  Nope, not at all.  I’ll take an unlocked phone over a locked phone any day.

Almost better than getting an unlocked phone, however, is the special pleasure of unhooking a phone from the claws of the grasping carrier who tried to lock you in in the first place.  That’s why this photo makes me so happy. It’s my Rogers iPhone, running on AT&T’s network using an old Cingular SIM that I had.

I have my pal Pat Phelan to thank for this one.  It was he who told me about Rebelsim, and sent me one of their cards.  Rebelsim is a thin, flexible circuit board that you combine with your existing SIM and insert into any mobile.  When the phone queries the SIM to find out which network it’s running on, Rebelsim takes over and passes back the expected network identifier.  Or at least, that’s how it appears.

The net result? I’m using my Rogers iPhone on AT&T’s network, and paying AT&T’s freight instead of $6,000/Gigabyte.  When I get back to Canada, I’ll just pop my Rogers SIM back in and use their much more affordable at-home data service.

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“What did you say
I know I saw you saying it
My ears won’t stop ringing
Long enough to hear
Those sweet words
What did you say”

Norah Jones

Nose jammed deep into a bowl of salty sweet udon, and listening to Norah Jones on my iPhone, I’ve been reflecting on the nature of conversations.  What makes talk into a conversation?  Does a conversation continue after the talking?  If so, what do you call the piece that continues?  If the conversation requires preparation, organization, or facilitation beforehand to make it valuable, is that also part of the conversation?

With my friends Bill Ryan and Andy Abramson we’ve been tossing around a concept which we’ve collectively dubbed Active Conversations which describe these ideas.  The key idea is simply this: a conversation is more than just talking.  It’s an iterative process of organization, preparation, facilitation, agreement, conclusions, actions, and follow up.  Lather, rinse, repeat.

It’s easy to see how this applies in a business context.  So often a business conversation finishes with not just a conclusion, but a series of action items leading to the organization of another meeting or conference call.  It’s incredibly rare to see a business conversation not result in follow on actions.  After all, that’s the engine that runs business.

But what about in the context of a podcast?  This week I’ve had the opportunity to chat with both Steve Gillmor and Sean Ammirati about their podcasts. Both are users of Calliflower, and I was interested in previewing some features we’re working on with them, as well as hearing feedback on how to improve Calliflower.  Needless to say, the idea of Active Conversations was at the forefront of my thinking as we were talking.  Podcasts, especially the way that Steve and Sean run Gillmor Gang / Newsgang and ReadWriteTalk respectively, are very much Active Conversations.  With a guest, multiple participants, chat walls, a follow up posting, comments, and a follow-on conversation these are quite definitely Active Conversations.

What other kinds of conversations are Active Conversations? Stay tuned… I’ll have more thoughts on this in the coming days.

Speculation that Microsoft might replace the IE rendering with WebKit is running high this morning after remarks made by Steve Ballmer in Australia.  Although hardly a ringing endorsement of WebKit, here’s why Steve (and Steve Sinofsky, Mr. Windows) should consider this:

1. The battle to own the presentation layer of the Web was lost long ago.  That presentation layer is controlled by the W3C not by any one company.  The industry, including Microsoft and Netscape, learned how damaging proprietary extensions could be during mid 90’s, and both companies vowed to support standards.
2. Notwithstanding standards, innovation can occur in browsers - rendering speed, add-on features, and so-on.  Apple and Google are proving this.  This is the ripe area for plucking right now, as opposed to spending resources on getting the latest HTML standard to render correctly.
3. Microsoft’s decision to push its own rendering engine is causing it immense harm in mobile.  Speaking as the CEO of a company with a browser based application, and mobile projects underway, the platforms that interest us the most are iPhone, Android and Nokia.  These are the easiest for us to support. What about Microsoft and RIM, both of which have substantial market share? BlackBerry is almost there.  RIM’s choice to build a proprietary browser, however, is working against them.  And Microsoft? Well, we don’t even IE 6 well on a desktop platform, let alone mobile. My bet is that modern mobile browsers are going to win the day.

So give it some more thought Steve (and Steve).  The IE rendering engine holds little strategic value, little opportunity for innovation, and it’s an impediment to developers supporting your mobile platforms.