VOIP Solution and Service

RCN Corporation has signed an agreement with Cedar Point Communications to deploy its integrated voice and multimedia SAFARI C³ switch for voice over internet protocol (VoIP) telephone services. The use of the multimedia switch is designed to compliment RCN’s current VoIP offering, primarily in Chicago, and provide additional on and off-net capabilities. SAFARI C³ is a centralized platform that bundles several PacketCable network elements into one device.
In Chicago, RCN initially launched VoIP in the last mile access network with its existing Lucent Class 5 switch, the GenBand G6 gateway, and multimedia terminal adapters from Motorola. The new Cedar Point platform will introduce the softswitch and full PacketCable-based offering. In addition to Chicago, RCN also provides services in Boston, New York, eastern Pennsylvania, Washington D.C., San Francisco, and Los Angeles.
RCN will begin its four month test in mid November and RCN will be able to offer VoIP services to residents and businesses through this switch. “We are excited about the prospect of expanding the RCN brand to our 6 million licensed homes,” said Rick Swiderski, Vice President of Network Engineering.

“In keeping with our innovative and forward-thinking DNA,” stated Richard Ramlall, SVP of Strategic and External Affairs, “we are excited about testing the possibilities of advanced VoIP in our top Metro markets.”

Cedar Point’s Executive Vice President, Strategy and Market Development, Dave Spear commented, “We are pleased to have this opportunity to trial our integrated voice and multimedia switch with RCN.”

Luca Filigheddu has given such good reviews about Sitofono in his website that I was tempted to try it and let my readers know about it. I can definitely say he was not wrong. This click-to-call solution offered by Abbeynet is really worth noting.

Sitofono is a simple click-to-call service that any web site or portal can use to get calls from their customers/website visitors for free. The websites can receive calls from their customers without the need for them to be registered to any VoIP service. The website or the portals can bind it to any fixed-line phone number worldwide for the over 60 country codes where Sitofono is active.

As for the customers, they don’t need to be registered to any VoIP service, they don’t need to have headphones, they don’t need to pay one single cent to call you. They just have to click and call you from their browser.

Just hold on. You don’t even need to have a website as well. Your email will work fine or you can get a personal Sitofono which can become your personal website. Starting from January 2007, Sitofono will offer a Voicemail for free as well and you’ll also be able to choose different numbers where you can be reached depending on the time of the day.

Click to call services are here to stay. They will make the difference between a normal, old web site and a truly 2.0 “speaking” website. Who can use it? Tell me who can’t? E-commerce portals, bloggers, banks, pubs, insurance, shops, mortgage portals, travel agents and so on and so forth.

Sitofono has just reached 100.000 business customers this week. It costs just € 499 /year, just about € 1,37 / day. As a perfect marketing strategy, Abbeynet is now giving away Sitofono for two months to selected companies which would like to try it out for FREE.

Google has just bought Jotspot, a silicon Valley startup that helped pioneer the market for collaborative business software like online spreadsheets. This is Google’s latest move into territory dominated by Microsoft.

Three year old Jotspot had developed a series of online productivity software programs that offer many of the functions of Microsoft Office programs like Microsoft Word or Excel spreadsheets. But instead of running on individual computers, Jotspot applications are delivered as Web-based services. Jotspot’s programs run on collaborative wiki software, a flexible form of Web publishing for groups that allows any approved user to edit or change individual documents. The 27-employee company has helped popularize the idea that wikis are not just for software geeks but can be used within small groups by non-technical office workers or family groups to accomplish practical scheduling or financial tasks.

Following the lead of companies like Jotspot, Mountain View, California-based Google entered the market this year by acquiring the Writely word processor and introducing other Web-based applications such as Google spreadsheets and Google calendar.

“It was pretty apparent that Google shared out vision for how groups of people can create, manage and share information online,” said Mr. Kraus, Jotspot’s co-founder and CEO. He was also a co-founder of Excite, one of the first internet search sites started in 1994.

Now, who dareth say Google is just a Web search player?

At Symbian Smartphone Show in London, Truphone announced a beta version of its free VoIP download for Nokia’s best-selling, Wi-Fi-enabled N80 mobile handset which will be available from the Truphone website soon.

Truphone handsets are free, worldwide. As a launch offer to the end of the year, USA users benefit from free calls to USA and Canada, while the unique UK telecoms market enables Truphone to offer UK users calls some two billion landlines in major countries for free until Dec 31st 2006. This means free mobiles calls to other Truphone users or very cheap calls to anyone else.

You can install Truphone wherever you are and begin making free or VoIP-rate calls right now. All you need is to download it. You will be given a Truphone number, which you can use to get a number of benefits over your current mobile.

Initially, only users in the UK and US will get Truphone numbers appropriate to their countries (i.e. +44 and +1 respectively). These users will be able to make and receive calls on their Truphone numbers just like a traditional mobile/cell phone.

Users in other countries will temporarily be given US Truphone numbers. They will be able to make free calls to other Truphone users and VoIP-rate calls to anyone else. We intend to roll out local numbering to other countries as soon as we can.

The company has opened a discussion forum at www.mobilevoipforum.org where users and developers can share their views and reviews

It is harder to monitor VoIP calls because servers and connections often sit in foreign countries, commonly the US, and a country’s law enforcement agency can not exercise the same power of discovery that they can over a phone provider’s records. Calls can also be harder to trace when they are free, since there is no billing record.

A report from a Swiss newspaper SonntagsZeitung says that the Swiss Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications is examining the use of a software to listen to VOIP conversations.

The software being assessed comes from Swiss company Era IT Solutions. The software is placed on to a user’s computer by that person’s internet service provider, but only on the orders of a judge, according to current plans.

The software records ongoing conversations and sends the recordings in broken up data packets back to a server controlled by the authorities. The software is also capable of monitoring what is going on in the room in which a computer is located. It can switch on a computer’s microphone so that the room itself can be eavesdropped on, according to the report.

The Swiss Surveillance Act does not allow for Trojan horse-type surveillance but federal criminal regulations do allow software-based wiretaps as long as they are controlled in the same manner as other surveillance equipment.

Troubleshooting network connectivity problems can be an irritating and time-consuming task. Fluke Networks has put an end to this problem with the NetTool Series II Inline Network Tester. NetTool combines powerful NetProve diagnostics, inline Gigabit vision, digital IntelliTone technology and network, IP Phone and PC configuration testing in one palm-sized tool, so you’ll have everything you need to quickly resolve even the toughest connectivity problem.

You can verify, isolate, and document network connectivity and application port response problems faster than ever before with automated NetProve diagnostics. Suppose you receive a call from a user blaming the network for slow application performance. Armed with a NetTool Series II, in seconds you can prove whether the network is truly at fault by seeing connectivity to key network devices and services. If the network is at fault, NetProve will isolate the source of the problem so you can fix it fast. If it is not the network, NetProve will identify which application port is slow to respond so you can dispatch the appropriate resource to correct the problem.

This provides you a front-line VoIP management tool for verify link readiness during pre-deployment planning, as well as troubleshoot problems on active networks by monitoring real-time VoIP traffic. Simple inline connectivity provides visibility into VoIP calls to quickly diagnose both IP phone boot-up and call control problems, and to measure key call quality metrics. Series II adds H.323 to existing SIP and SCCP support.

Many people see the initial savings over traditional phone service and think they are getting a good deal, however many times they are paying almost double for VoIP just to have a single bill for all three services. So if you are already paying for Cable TV and High Speed Internet from the cable company dont be tricked into adding VoIP from them also.

Using the cable companies for your VoIP needs can cost you $23.00 more a month just to keep your Cable, Internet, and Phone on one bill. The VoIP service that the cable companies are offering is usually no better than most VoIP providers out there regardless of what the sales person tells you. Take a look at what these cable companies have to offer:

• Comcast Digital Voice: Comcast offers an unlimited US & Canada calling package for $39.95 a month when you purchase their high speed internet service. If you would like to keep your existing internet service from a competitor then the price jumps to $54.95.

• Wide Open West (WOW): WOW offers two choices, the WOW phone Basic and Advanced plans. The basic service offer unlimited calling in the US with Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3Way Calling, and Call Return(*69). The Advanced plan offers the same features as the basic plan and Caller ID, Repeat Dial, Selective Call Forwarding, and Voice Mail. The Basic plan costs around $25.00 a month when you purchase their high speed internet service. The Advanced plan costs around $30.00 a month when you purchase their high speed internet service. WOW does not offer VoIP unless you purchase internet service from them.

• Bright HouseNetworks: Bright house offers what they call Digital Phone for their VoIP plan. The plan offers unlimited calling in the US with Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3Way Calling, and Call Return(*69), Caller ID, Repeat Dial, and Selective Call Forwarding. The plan costs $39.99 a month when you purchase their high speed internet service or $49.99 if you use your existing internet service provider.

• Time Warner: Time Warner offers what they call Digital Phone for their VoIP plan. The plan offers unlimited calling in the US with Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, 3Way Calling, and Call Return(*69), Caller ID, Repeat Dial, and Selective Call Forwarding plus a few more. The plan costs $39.99 a month when you purchase their high speed internet service.

Orange plans to offer mobile phones that can also make VoIP calls over a home Wi-Fi router. Orange had first announced its plans for the service naming it as Unik (for “unique”) on May 31. With this announcement Orange joins a growing number of European network operators offering similar services.

The new service will be available to Orange customers who subscribe to both its GSM mobile phone network and its DSL broadband Internet access service. Using a special mobile phone costing from €99 ($125), they will be able to make unlimited calls from home, connecting via Wi-Fi to their Livebox DSL home router. When they are outdoors, calls will be carried over Orange’s GSM network at the usual rates.

The Livebox can carry up to three simultaneous Wi-Fi calls, Orange said. Although Orange also offers GSM and DSL services in the U.K, it had said earlier that Unik would only be available in France.

Similar services combining GSM and Wi-Fi are available elsewhere in Europe, including BT Group’s Fusion, launched in the U.K. last year, Deutsche Telekom’s T-One, which opened in Germany in August, and TeliaSonera’s service Home Free, now available in Denmark.

When Apple Computer Inc first introduced digital music palyer and companion iTunes music software, it created a legitimate market for music downloads and solved a problem vexing the technology industry. Nearly five years later, analysts anticipate Apple will deliver a product to solve the entertainment industry’s current dilemma: how to bridge the gap between the living room television and the computer.

Analysts speculated that Apple may stream movie videos directly on to television sets, or connect Apple’s smallest desktop computer, the MacMini, to the TV with a more user-friendly interface, or use an upgraded video iPod to make the link.

Apple is introducing new technologies…OK. But we, as VoIP adorers, are waiting with baited breath when apple explores this market.

Recently every other industry heavyweights is being swept with the VoIP craze. Just this month, Microsoft added VoIP features to Windows Live Messenger, which will be available to users of its forthcoming Vista operating system. Meanwhile, last year Google released Google Talk, a similar software-based service.

So, for those who are waiting for VoIP news from Apple, insiders say that Software engineers at Apple Computer have been toiling away on a new set of features that will allow users of its next-generation Mac OS X operating system to place phone calls over their Internet connection. Apple is expected to bundle iChat 4.0 with the operating system overhaul, code-named Leopard and VoIP Internet dialing may just be one of several new features in it. This move will pit the Apple-branded video conferencing and instant message software against existing VoIP solutions from the likes of Skype, Google and Microsoft.

Technology is advancing by leaps and bounds. The question arises as to how the issues of privacy should be dealt with in new technologies.

In the case of VoIP, there has been a great deal of controversy regarding its legal aspects. As the popularity of VoIP grows, governments are becoming more interested in regulating VoIP in a manner similar to legacy PSTN services.

In U.S., the Federal Communications Commission now requires all VoIP operators who do not support Enhanced 911 to attach a sticker warning that traditional 911 services aren’t available.

The FCC recently required VoIP operators to support CALEA wiretap functionality. The Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA), requires telecommunications services to rewire their networks to provide police and the FBI with guaranteed access to wiretaps.

The combination of 1964 federal wiretap laws (and its numerous amendments), along with CALEA, have put the FBI in a position to have the authority to wiretap broadband services. It means that federal authorities are able, not only to monitor telephone calls made by VoIP, but any data transmissions that are made over the broadband service, giving access to privileged information, confidential or business trade secrets, and sensitive medical information.

Some companies, such as MetaSwitch and Cisco Systems, Inc. have made their technologies CALEA compliant, providing FBI backdoor access to any VoIP transmissions. However, technological limitations will still inevitably lead to over-inclusive sweeps of data transmissions

The Telecommunications Act of 2005 proposes adding more traditional PSTN regulations, such as local number portability and universal service fees. Other future legal issues are likely to include laws against wiretapping and network neutrality.

Some Latin American countries, fearful for their state owned telephone services, have imposed restrictions on the use of VoIP, including in Panama where VoIP is taxed. In Ethiopia, where a totalitarian government is monopolizing telecommunication service, it is a criminal offence to offer services using VoIP. The country has installed firewalls to prevent international calls being made using VoIP. These measures were taken after a popularity in VoIP reduced the income generated by the state owned telecommunication company.

In the European Union, the treatment of VoIP service providers is a decision for each Member State’s national telecoms regulator, which must use competition law theory to define relevant national markets and then determine whether any service provider on those national markets has “significant market power” (and so should be subject to certain obligations). A general distinction is usually made between VoIP services that function over managed networks (via broadband connections) and VoIP services that function over unmanaged networks (essentially, the Internet).