Graves On SOHO Technology

You know what they say about a fool and his money…soon parted. Or was that “soon partying?” I can never recall.

It seems that Sprint & partner Clear have just launched their 4G/Wimax service here in Houston. Not too long ago I noted that the service was already offered in places like Austin and Lubbock (Yes, Lubbock!) but not in the major cities.

Houston is the 4th largest city in the country and covers a lot of ground. The Sprint press release claims the 1,900 square miles are now covered, or over 4 million people. Clearly, this launch had to be a major undertaking.

The trouble is that I’m only 7 months into a 2 year contract with Sprint for 3G wireless using a Novatel Mifi. I was tempted into the service by Andy Abramson who tweeted about a free hardware deal in early August.

I am soooo open to influence in some cases.

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The FCC’s Blair Levin, Executive Director of the National Broadband Initiative, discusses reactions from legislators, the telecommunications industry and public interest groups to the plan.

This will ultimately effect us all, so it’s good to stay informed as the matter progresses.

Much is being made of the recent events in the IETF CODEC Working Group . Specifically, the fact that Skype has included the c source code for their SILK codec in the Draft RFC document.

Dan York has some excellent coverage including a good general backgrounder on the matter. Jim Courtney has also posted something interesting, as has Phil Wolff of Skype Journal.

A lot of what is being expressed seems to me unbridled enthusiasm for what is seen as a bold, even surprising move on the part of Skype. I agree that this is a gutsy move…and one that I applaud. However, I’m also here to reign in the enthusiasm just a bit. Tempering it with a dose of reality we can see this in a larger context and keep our eyes on the larger goal…ubiquitous wideband telephony.

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At CTIA this week AT&T announced the availability of OpenPeak’s OpenTablet 7 on their network. Engadget has a nice long video interview with OpenPeak’s CEO, looking over a lot of the product line.

Originally published September 24, 2009 at Small Net Builder

A little over a year ago, I was offered the daunting task of reviewing the Polycom Soundpoint IP550 & IP650 desk phones. It was a considerable challenge being tasked with the review of these top-of-the-line products from a company that is considered by many to be a market-leader in enterprise VoIP.

Well, that review was easy compared to my current task of evaluating one of their newest offerings; the VVX-1500 Business Media Phones. I almost wish that I hadn’t agreed to undertake the project, because these devices have a wealth of features. But here I am, having had the phones for a couple of months. So I thought I’d best make good on my promise to describe these beasties in some detail.

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A couple of weeks ago we received a promotional mailer from Comcast about their new Digital Voice service with the optional HomePoint. If I might quote Robert Plant, “Ooooooh, it makes me wonder.” Is Comcast doing anything with respect to HDVoice?

I had forgotten about HomePoint, the cordless phone that Comcast was promoting as a premium voice option. Doug Mohney pointed out it’s soft launch back in October 2009, when not too much was known about the hardware or the service.

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