Disruptive Telephony

"Hey, that's a Mitel IP phone... I remember when that handset was introduced. It was very different from the previous one but had better 'shoulderability' ... it created a bit of a stir among customers, though. Hmmm... I wonder what model IP phone that is......"

All of this was running through my head during a routine visit to my bank this morning while waiting at a counter talking to someone. He had to call another office so there I was looking at his desk phone.

It happens to me all the time!

Even though I left Mitel way back in 2007... and really left IP telephony when I left Voxeo in 2011... IP telephony hasn't left me!

I'll be at a hotel... and I am checking out their phone system. A bank... an office... Wherever! There's a Cisco IP phone... there's an Avaya... there's a Mitel... a snow... a I-have-no-clue...

I guess it's just an occupational hazard of having been a product manager for IP phones during my time at Mitel... or maybe just the 6 years I spent there learning about IP telephony... but I just always see the IP phones. :-)

Facebook today rolled out it's free voice calling in the US via its Messenger app for iOS (iPhone/iPad). The Verge was the first I saw with the news and a great number of sites are now following.

Voice calling through Facebook has the potential to be hugely disruptive... rather than calling on your phone over your regular phone connection - or even rather than using Skype, you can just call from directly within Facebook. This is the kind of "Over-The-Top (OTT)" app that gives telco operators a fit... goodbye, telco voice minutes!

Plus, it's using some HD voice codec so the sound quality is outstanding.

And since the folks at Facebook want you to live your life inside of their very pretty walls, this just provides yet one more reason for you to stay within those walls.

BUT... there's a big huge caveat that I'll get to in a moment.
 

A Quick Walkthrough

First, though, let's look at how it works. When you go into the Messenger app and open a chat with a friend (in this case, Jim Courtney), all you have to do is click the "i" button in the upper right:

After you do that you will get a window that I showed at the beginning of an article where you have a "Free Call" button.

When you press that, you begin a call experience very similar to any other call on your iPhone. First you are connecting to the other person and then you are in the actual call:

There is apparently the standard accept and decline buttons. (I neglected to have Jim call me back to get a screenshot.) While you are in the call you have a button to hang up, a speakerphone button and a microphone mute button. The last button is very nice in that it lets you remain in the call while using other features of your iPhone. In these two screenshots you can see that I could access our Messenger chat and also go back to my main iPhone screen to launch other applications. I can always tap the bar at the top to return to Messenger and the controls to our voice conversation:

The voice quality during the conversation was outstanding. It was crystal clear and rich enough that we knew it was some kind of HD voice codec being used.

All in all it was an excellent experience.

The Big, Huge Caveat

So what's the problem? Well... the reality is that right now trying to find someone to call is a struggle!

Going down through my contacts in the Messenger app was an exercise in futility. Person after person after person had the "Free Call" button greyed out:

Here's the fundamental problem:

You must be running the MESSENGER app on your iPhone!

It doesn't matter if you are running the Facebook application on your iPhone... you must be running Messenger.

And bizarrely there is no linkage between the two applications. If I am over in the Facebook application and go into a chat with Jim Courtney, notice that I have only the ability to "View Timeline":

And of course you must have an iPhone or iPad. If you have an Android device or some other device you are out of luck right now.

So the only people you can use this with are other people running Messenger on iOS.

Presumably Facebook is assuming people will just keep Messenger running... but I know that I, for one, try to limit the number of apps I keep running on my iPhone for battery life reasons.

More fundamentally, I never have used the Messenger app for chatting with other friends in Facebook. The Facebook app already provides the ability to chat... so why would I use the Messenger app? (And I know Facebook focuses on the speed that you can get to sending messages... but that's not critical for me.)

Potential For Disruption?

Now if Facebook gets their act together and makes this more intuitive and ubiquitous, the potential is there for more serious disruption. If it can be integrated into the main Facebook app... and can work for Android as well as iOS... and can work for people outside the US and Canada... THEN we might see more people shifting voice calls over into Facebook's voice service.

The potential is certainly huge, given Facebook's massive size.

Until then... it's an interesting option to have available... but I just don't see many people using it.

What About The Technology Behind It?

My other natural question was to wonder what they are using for the technology behind their voice service. As The Verge pointed out, Facebook and Skype have had a partnership to deliver video calling within Facebook's website. Could this be another component of that partnership? Is it a partnership with another VoIP provider? Is it something homegrown?

For now, I haven't seen any details that help explain that, but I'll certainly be watching to see what we can learn.

UPDATE: A tweet from Aswath Rao pointed me to a TechCrunch article from earlier this month when Facebook rolled out free voice calling in Canada that indicates that the technology is NOT from Skype. Separately I asked a Skype representative if Skype was involved in today's rollout and received the simple answer of "no".

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Today Skype launched an attack on sending photos via Apple's iMessage, via email or via traditional SMS/MMS with the release of photo sharing for the iPhone and iPad versions of Skype. The key point of the blog post to me is this:

There's no limit on the size of the file you can send, so you can send photos without reaching email size limits or paying expensive MMS charges.

This is yet another example of Skype seeking to disrupt the traditional telecom industry as an "over-the-top (OTT)" app - and make the user experience that much easier. (And yes, I am fully aware that Skype for Android has had file sharing since December 2011.)

Skype's blog post doesn't directly mention Apple's iMessage, but that's the reality of what else will be disrupted. Think about it... here is what you have for options inside the built-in "Photos" capability of an iPhone:

You can either email the photo or use the "Message" which goes either through the traditional SMS/MMS route - or via iMessage. This Skype functionality replaces both of those capabilities... although you need to be in the Skype application to use the sharing. Note that for a reason I'll explain later, Skype's photo sharing does NOT replace what you can share with Twitter.

Using Photo Sharing on an iPhone

I'll admit that I didn't find the sharing of the photo immediately intuitive on the iPhone, largely because Skype overloaded the "phone" icon in the upper right corner to do more than just initiate a call. In the new version, after you enter a chat with someone and tap the phone icon, you get a menu where you can share the photo:

After choosing to send a photo, you then can choose to take a new photo or share an existing photo:

The recipient then needs to accept the photo transfer, after which you see an indicator bar showing the progress - and then the fact that the photo was transferred:

From a recipient point of view, receiving the photo is simply a matter of watching the blue progress bar and then seeing the photo displayed:

I'll note that it displays nicely in a landscape view as well, although the photo is actually displayed larger in the portrait view:

All in all a fairly straightforward experience and I thank my friend Dean Elwood for helping me test this out. The re-use of the "phone" icon is a bit strange - and non-intuitive - but once you get used to that it's okay.

Using Photo Sharing on an iPad

Photo sharing on the iPad was very similar, with the added benefit that the icon in the upper right was the much more intuitive "+" symbol. Again, when in a chat with someone you just touch the "+" and choose "Send Photo":

You again have the choice to take a photo or use an existing photo:

After which the photo nicely appears within the Skype client:

Again, a rather straightforward and easy user experience.

The Desktop Disconnect

While this works great for sending photos between iOS devices (and I will assume to Android devices), the user of the traditional Skype desktop app does not have such a seamless experience. Here is what happened when I accepted a photo from Dean in the latest Skype for Mac version:

I then had to double-click the icon to open the image in the separate "Preview" application on my Mac. It would be great if in some future version of the desktop version of Skype the images would be displayed inline as they are on the mobile versions.

The Android Difference

It's also interesting to note that Skype for Android lets you share any kind of files, beyond just photos. As noted in the Skype for Android FAQ:

You can send and receive any type of file over Skype for Android and can view any file you receive as long as you have the necessary software or application installed. There are no limits on the size of the file you can send. As long as the person you’re sending the file to has enough memory on their phone, they can store the file.

Several mobile developer friends have indicated that this is due to the difference in the mobile operating systems and the fact that Android gives developers access to more file capabilities than does iOS. Still, it's just an interesting difference between the platforms.

Not Displacing Facebook / Instagram / Google+ / Twitter / etc.

My initial thought on seeing Skype's blog post was that Skype was going to try to take on photo sharing services like Facebook, Instagram, Google+ or even Twitter. It became rapidly clear that this photo sharing service is NOT attempting to do that (yet, anyway). A couple of reasons:

1. It only works with 1-to-1 chats. You can only get that "Send Photo" button when you are in a direct, 1-to-1 chat with another Skype user. When you are in a group chat, there is no way to share a photo. If there was, you could start using groups as a way to share photos... but that capability isn't there.

2. There is no web access for photos. When you share a photo there is no URL you could give someone else to see the photo. The photo does not appear to be stored on any server anywhere. Rather it is simply transferred from one local Skype client to another local Skype client.

3. Both Skype clients must be online. The sender and recipient both have to be online for the photo to be transferred. This is true of all Skype file transfers and photos are no different.

For the moment this seems all about sharing a photo with someone else with whom you are conversing.

So Who Will Use This Photo Sharing in Skype?

But will people actually use this new feature? After all, Skype's blog post today refers to this as "a frequently requested feature." (Although without any details about by whom it was requested.)

I'm going to guess that Skype's proverbial use case is that you were out during the day, took some photos, and then some time later are in a voice or video call with someone and want to share the photos of what you did earlier. It's the old "Look, Grandma, here are some great photos of us at the amusement park!"

Or maybe you came back from a trip and want to share some photos with someone you call... or maybe you are in the midst of a trip and want to call home and share the photos. ("Hey, Dan, just calling you from our hotel in Rome. Look at all the cool cathedrals we saw over the last few days!")

I could see that usage... subject to my caveat below.

The Battery Problem

Skype's blog post shows the case of a young woman sending a photo to a friend of some new shoes she found. As compelling as this might be...

... I would never use Skype this way!

Or at least... I haven't yet.

Why not?

Skype for iOS drains the battery rather quickly!

For that reason I never leave Skype running on either my iPad or iPhone. I do use Skype while traveling, but it's a case of firing up Skype, making the call and then killing off Skype on the iOS device so that the batteries will last longer.

Instead for sharing photos I would simply send off the photo via Apple's iMessage... or email the photo to someone.

Now, in Skype's post today, they indicate that this new release for iOS includes performance improvements that will help with battery life:

We've also improved the overall performance of Skype's mobile apps. We've made them less battery hungry when running in the background, so you'll now be able to answer Skype calls throughout the day when they come in. And, as you'll be able to keep Skype open, you can respond to or send IMs to friends and colleagues all day long.

That, to me, will be the key for the usage and adoption of this photo sharing. I need to be comfortable leaving Skype running on my iOS devices - and so do my recipients. If we all get to the point where Skype is just "always on" on our iOS (and Android) devices... then yes, we might start using this as a way to share photos.

Undoubtedly that is how Skype / Microsoft would like the scenario to play out... we'll have to see how indeed that does work out.

What do you think? Will you use this photo sharing within Skype for the iPhone or iPad? Or will you use one of the other ways to share photos within iOS?

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UPDATE, 22 Aug 2012 - Jim Courtney published a piece with his views: Skype Photo Sharing: A Conversation Feature – Not an App

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When I first saw the news today, my immediate reaction was:

Seriously? Digium is coming out with phones???

In a rather fascinating move in an already extremely crowded market, Digium announced today that they will be producing "Digium Phones", a new line of IP phones specifically targeted at users of Asterisk and Switchvox (both Digium products). They tout among the benefits:

• Crystal clear HD Voice
• Simple setup and installation
• Tightest integration with Asterisk
• Built-in & custom applications
• A built-in "app engine" JavaScript API

There will be three models available:

• D40—An entry-level HD IP phone with 2-line keys. Priced at $149.
• D50—A mid-level HD IP phone with 4-line keys and 10 quick dial/BLF keys with paper labels. Priced at $179.
• D70—An executive-level HD IP phone with 6-line keys and 10 quick dial/BLF keys on an additional LCD screen. Priced at $279

The news release indicates they will be available in April and are currently on display at ITEXPO this week down in Miami. A datasheet is available

Application Platform

What is perhaps most interesting to me is the "app engine" included in the phone. From the news release:

Digium phones include an app engine with a simple yet powerful JavaScript API that lets programmers create custom apps that run on the phones. They aren’t simply XML pages; Digium phone apps can interface directly with core phone features.

Many IP phone vendors have tried various systems like this to let developers build more apps into the phone with varying degrees of success. What makes Digium different, though, is that it comes from the developer community. The history of people working with Asterisk is the history of tinkering and hacking away on the systems. In fact, in the early days, that was all you could do. No fancy GUIs... just configuration files and cryptic APIs. As a result, Digium has a very strong developer community (they claim 80,000+ developers) who just may be able to make use of this new API.

What remains to be seen is what kind of applications you can really build with these phones - and how easy it is to install and or use these apps.

Are They Crazy?

But are they crazy for entering the already insanely-crowded IP phone market? Particularly at a time when enterprise smartphone usage is increasing - and may often be the preferred communication medium? And when people are becoming increasingly comfortable with softphones, courtesy largely of Skype and "Unified Communications" desktop apps like Microsoft Lync and similar apps from Cisco, Avaya, Siemens, IBM and more?

I completely understand that Digium would want to make the Asterisk "user experience" much easier and simpler. Particularly as Digium continually seeks to move beyond their traditional more developer-centric audience into businesses and enterprises. Many of those folks want a system that "just works." If they can order a system from Cisco or Avaya that comes complete with the IP PBX, IP Phones, etc. and it all just works, they may choose that over a less-expensive but harder-to-put-together solution using Asterisk.

As these new Digium IP phones are "designed exclusively for Asterisk and Switchvox," they should remove that pain and make it much simpler to get an Asterisk solution up and running. (Side note: Does this "designed exclusively" phrase mean they won't work with other systems? Or just that they work better with Asterisk? UPDATE: Digium's Kevin Fleming answered in the comments - the phones are SIP phones that will work with any system for basic features.)

Still, the IP phone space is incredibly crowded. One vendor of VoIP products, VoIPSupply.com, lists 382 results for IP phones. A quick scan of that list will show you names like Polycom, Snom, Grandstream and Aastra, all of whom have been typical phones used with Asterisk-based systems. (As well as Cisco, Avaya and other more "traditional" telecom players.)

What will these new direct-from-Digium IP phones do to the relationships with those other IP phone vendors?

Much of Digium's early business was with PSTN gateway cards that you could install into your computer. With much of that market moving entirely over to SIP trunking or SIP-based gateways, is the IP phone line designed primarily to replace that fading revenue line? Or to simply provide another revenue source for the company - perhaps at the expense of partners?

And what is the state of the market for IP phones, anyway? Analyst firm Frost and Sullivan says the market for SIP phones will continue growing and NoJitter's Eric Krapf has reported that IP phone vendors are seeing strong growth.

Still, with the "consumerization of IT" and the "bring-your-own-device" movement as people want to use their iPhones, Android phones, iPads, tablets, etc., it seems a curious move to launch a brand new line of IP phones.

However, Digium - and Asterisk - hasn't gotten to where it is by following the conventional wisdom. If anyone can carry off the launch of a new IP phone line, they may be able to do it. It will certainly be interesting to see where this takes them.

A new IP phone line... in 2012?

I would never have thought I'd be writing about that.

What do you think? Crazy move? or smart?

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Great stats out of the Silicon Alley Insider's Chart of Day for this past Tuesday:

There was a 31% increase in active smartphones over the Thanksgiving weekend compared to the week prior...

The SAI post explains the chart and how the data was gathered:

Cool info to see!

(Although the paranoid security guy inside of me is admittedly wondering how many of the apps on my iPhone include Flurry's "analytics software" and what exactly it is sending to them... )

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The phone on my desk rang a second time today. I glanced at the console, didn't recognize the Caller ID and simply ignored the call. A minute or two later a text message buzzed on my iPhone with a transcription of the voicemail left by the caller. I took one look and knew right away:

Yep, another telemarketer!

Just like another call earlier today. As I did my little glance-ignore-wait-for-text-message routine I realized yet again how my communications channels have changed over the years. Here is the reality:

I pretty much NEVER answer my desk phone.

Why not? Pretty simple, really:

The people who I want to speak with already know how to get in touch with me!

And the "how" comes down to: unified communications and mobile.

Unified Communications

For instance, we're huge users of Skype internally at Voxeo. I have everyone in the company as a contact, and am in a zillion various group chats with internal employees. If someone within the company wants to reach me, they will:

• Check my presence on Skype. Am I online? If so, am I "away"? or "busy/Do Not Disturb"?
  
  
• Send me an IM - asking if they can call me if it's urgent.

Note that second bullet... internal communication starts in IM and then migrates to voice and possibly video if our conversation needs to be "higher bandwidth" than typing.

I can't honestly remember the last time someone internally actually rang my desk phone, because, if I'm not online, there's also...

Mobile

If I'm not online, or if it's urgent, people know to call me on my mobile phone. I carry it basically everywhere. And whether they dial that direct number or they call my Google Voice number that rings that phone... either way they reach me on my mobile.

It's Not Just Internal

Most of the people who I regularly want to talk to outside my company are also linked to me via Skype or one of the other IM networks (and mostly via Skype) or social networks. Or they have my mobile number. Possibly we've connected via some other way... email... Twitter... Facebook... and if we need to go to voice, we've exchanged mobile phone numbers... or we'll use an app in one of the social services (like Facebook Telephone or Twelephone) that connects us via voice through that service. They don't call my desk phone.

Which Leaves the Desk Phone For What?

Spam! Er... "telemarketing calls". Usually from someone trying to sell me some service that will magically generate millions of leads... or giving me a "personal invitation" to some event. Randomly there might be someone out there who I actually want to speak with - my deskphone number is on my business card, after all - and if so I will definitely return the call after I see the voicemail transcription.

Otherwise... it just sits there as a number out there to attract telemarketers...

How about you? Do you answer your desk phone much any more? Do people actually call you on it?

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Cisco, Avaya and RIM are all rushing out "tablet" devices now for the enterprise market - but will they actually matter?  Will enterprises really want to use these high-end and high-priced tablets versus all the new consumer tablets like the iPad and all the various Android and Windows tables in the queue?

Don't get me wrong ... it think it is awesome that Cisco, Avaya and RIM are all coming out with new tablets. Ever since getting an iPad back in early May it has become a constant companion on my travels around and I use it for so many different purposes.

The touch interface is also so incredibly "natural"... I watch my daughters using the iPad and just have to think: "Why shouldn't computers just work this way?"

Any user interface improvements that improve the communications user experience are very definitely a GOOD thing!

So I commend Cisco, Avaya and RIM for coming out with tablets.

I just still find myself wondering why I might want to pay to buy one of these tablets. I had this exchange yesterday with analyst Brian Riggs on Twitter:

As I said, I already have a SIP client on my iPad (and there are several options, in fact). I already have Skype. I already have WebEx and GoToMeeting for collaboration (and many other apps). Sure, I don't have video on the iPad - yet - but there are a range of Android consumer tablets coming out that do, and I wouldn't be surprised if Apple announces an iPad with a video camera sometime soon. Apple loves FaceTime right now... I wouldn't be surprised to see the iPad join the game.

I think Brian's point is the key:

avaya, cisco are betting they can do comms on tablets better than apple, etc.

And to a point, they are probably right. Real-time communications IS different than traditional web communications. This is very true.

There is, though, this one wee minor detail:

Apple has an entire ecosystem of developers building apps!

If Apple can deliver a hardware platform that provides the necessary devices (like an embedded camera for video), I would see the developer community rushing to use it. (And the Android community already has multiple devices coming out.)

On a more personal level, I've found my iPad to be much more like my mobile phone... it's a device I take with me to both personal and business functions/meetings/events. It's a "converged" device in that it reflects the blurring of the lines between my personal and business lives. I don't know that I'd want yet-another-device to carry around.

There is certainly the case that in large enterprises where you go to work on a "campus", the ability to have a work-specific device like this that you carry around could be valuable. But even there I'm not sure that I wouldn't also want my personal information, etc. with me. And isn't part of the value of a tablet that you could bring it home with you or while you are traveling?

Again, I commend the vendors on trying out a new form factor and user interface... I just find myself wondering why people won't simply want to use the consumer devices that are rapidly proliferating.

What do you think? Would you use a tablet from a communications vendor? Or would you want them to instead have apps that run on consumer devices?

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I own an iPhone. We have two, in fact... one that is my corporate phone provided by Voxeo and one that we bought for my wife as her personal phone. In the couple years I have been using it I have come to truly enjoy the user interface, the AppStore, the ecosystem, etc. It truly has changed how we as a society think of mobile devices.

But though I may be a Apple "fanboy" in many ways, I do have some grave concerns... such as the lock-in to the closed system controlled by Apple, which I wrote about at length related to the iPad. As a believer in open standards and an advocate for the open Internet, I'm glad to see Android out there... even as I read about it on my iPhone.

So naturally I was intrigued to read Paul Thurrott's piece titled "Droid Attack Spells Doom for iPhone". I've been reading Paul's writing for years related to various Microsoft and Windows topics... so when one of the chief Windows evangelists I know writes about Android... well, I pay attention to it a bit. Paul relays the story of his wife's move to a Droid phone and his own experience upon receiving a Droid X. (With, of course, the obligatory reference to Windows Phone 7 which he naturally views as superior. :-) )

You can read the piece for his full review, but he believes the devices truly have parity with the iPhone... and the "horrible" Android Market is where the Droid offerings fall down. He ends with this:

Aside from the abysmal online store experiences, however, Android and the Droid X are first rate. And looking ahead, I'll be comparing this system to the upcoming first generation Windows Phone 7 devices and to Apple's latest iPhone to see where these systems fall. For now, however, Android and the Droid X are, warts and all, already neck and neck with the iPhone 4. It's scary to think how one-sided this would be if Google just put a handful of UI experts on the marketplace. Game over, Apple. Game over.

That's the point, though. Apple has focused on the user experience. If you buy into the whole Apple stack (meaning their devices, iTunes, even Mac OS X), it's a wonderfully simple, easy-to-use, painless - and often delightful - experience.

But again, Apple's ecosystem is a closed, walled garden controlled by Apple. The user experience is so simple because Apple has constrained the choices. Open systems are messy. Open standards take a (usually long) while to evolve and converge.

The challenge before Google, and before Microsoft as they attempt again to re-enter the space, is to promote an open system[1] yet still deliver the simple and easy user experience that Apple delivers. I hope on one level that they succeed... we need the competition out there to keep the innovation accelerating. But it's a big challenge.

I don't think, Paul, that it's "Game over" for Apple at all... I think the game is just going to get more interesting...

[1] And I actually don't know how "open" Microsoft's system will be...

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As readers know, my upgrading of my iPhone 3G to iOS 4.0 was one of the dumbest IT moves I've made in ages and turned it into a virtually useless piece of junk.  (This video someone made sadly shows how bad it was.)  Rather than undertaking one of the various processes to downgrade my iPhone to iOS 3.1.3, I decided to wait a couple of weeks to see if either: 1) Apple released a fix; or 2) my number would come up in Voxeo's internal queue of upgrades to the iPhone 4.

As it happened, both events happened near the same time. :-)

Just in time for my next trip when I would need to be using the iPhone 3G, I did upgrade it to iOS 4.1 and was delighted to find that:

IT WAS A SNAIL NO MORE!

The phone got back its snappiness and it no longer took forever to open up applications or even let me answer a call. It still didn't seem as quick as it might have been before... but it was now in the realm of USABLE.

So if you made the mistake of upgrading your iPhone 3G to iOS 4.0 and have not already moved to 4.1, I can tell you that it worked great for me and hopefully will for you as well.

P.S. So why am I writing some of this article in the past tense? Well, a couple of days after returning from my trip, a small box arrived at my home from Voxeo HQ... yes, indeed, my place in Voxeo's upgrade queue had been reached and I now have a shiny new iPhone 4! So at this point my concern about my 3G has gone away ... :-)

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As readers know, I recently wrote about how upgrading my iPhone 3G to iOS 4.0 was one of the dumbest things I've done and also recently linked to Lifehacker's post about downgrading your iPhone 3G. So naturally you can expect that I'd be amused by this recent parody of Apple's commercial:

Sadly, it's far too true... (although I haven't yet personally experienced the issue with not being able to accept a call)

Kudos to "adamburtle" for putting the video together.

P.S. I learned of this video through the ZDNet article, Apple should advise against upgrading iPhone 3G to iOS4... and yes, Apple should make it clear that you will severely degrade the performance of your iPhone 3G by "upgrading" it.

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