With RIM's annual WES event starting later today we started to see announcements Monday about a new Blackberry and a new VC fund for mobile applications.

Blackberry Bold is definitely a major smartphone enhancement from the current Pearl, Curve and, most notably, 88x0 lines. Reading through the new specs, the Blackberry Bold addresses several issues that have been of concern in the past:

• triband 3G support extends support to GPRS/EDGE/HDSPA networks
• "push button" WiFI setup to readily access "protected" WiFi access points
• significantly improved multimedia support - overall (streaming) video performance, iTunes synchronization, new media player, improved display
• and, while they're still working on it prior to the Blackberry Bold's summer release, a new web browser.

Amongst the new specs:

• faster processor (@ 624 MHz, the fastest Blackberry)
• 128MB internal Flash memory but also 1GB on-board storage memory
  • expandable to 16GB via MicroSD/SDHC slot
• 2 megapixel camera
• GPS with Blackberry MapsBlackberry MediaSync to transfer media from iTunes
• half-VGA "ultra-bright" display (480 x 320)
• higher capacity battery:

Of particular note; it maintains the traditional QWERTY keyboard with ergonomic improvements - a key Blackberry defining feature relative to iPhone -- and is its "trackball ergonomics" their response to iPhone's touch screen?

With its newly enhanced, high performance browser and high-resolution, ultra-bright display, the BlackBerry Bold smartphone gives users an on-the-go web browsing experience with desktop-style depiction. The trackball mimics a mouse, making it easy to navigate sites in "Page View" or "Column View" or to zoom in on specific parts of a web page, while various emulation settings allow users to choose between the full desktop-style HTML content and layout or the mobile version. Attachments can also now be downloaded from within the browser and there is support for watching streaming videos (RTSP – real-time streaming protocol).

While the official press release talks about it as a "business" smartphone, Crackberry.com reports from the WES preview day:

Target Market? There's been a lot of talk about the target market for the 9000/BlackBerry Bold. The basic confusion to date is that it looks a bit "enterprisey", but has a camera built-in which historically screams consumer device. What it comes down to is that RIM didn't have an enterprise/consumer target in mind with the BlackBerry Bold. The real goal here was to build a high-end device that was the ultimate BlackBerry to date... the BlackBerry on Juice (err..Steroids)... putting WiFi/GPS/3G into one unit with a Speeeedy Processor and some More Memory. So there's no target market per se, but there is an Appeal...and the BlackBerry Bold is going to Appeal to BOTH Enterprise and Consumers. It'll appeal to the Business Executive and it will appeal to us Gadgetholics who just HAVE to have the best device on the market.

In addition it appears that iPhone is not the only smartphone getting VC funding support for applications. Yesterday RBC Financial, Thomson Reuters and RIM announced the Blackberry Partners Fund - $150 million "to invest in mobile applications and services for the BlackBerry® platform and other mobile platforms". Toronto's JLA Ventures, who have been involved in startups for over ten years, is a co-manager of the fund along with RBC Financial. Long time personal acquaintance Rick Segal of JLA talks about the fund and JLA's role; also Rick is interviewed by VentureBeat. Rick emphasizes that mobile applications only make business sense if they run on multiple mobile platforms, including Blackberry, and that only JLA and RBC Financial will make the funding decisions with no role for RIM.

Looking forward to using iSkoot and IM+ for Skype on the Blackberry Bold. While the Blackberry Bold represents advances in device resource issues, there are still thecarrier issues of network capacity, mobile VoIP call quality and unlimited data plan availability to be addressed before we see a reliable mobile VoIP client running on a smartphone.

Tags: RIM, Blackberry, Blackberry Bold, Blackberry Partners Fund, Rick Segal, JLA Ventures, RBC Financial, iSkoot, IM+ for Skype

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Guest post by Kent E. Soulé, San Francisco, California

It used to be possible to import GMail contacts into Skype (actually, Skype would search my GMail contacts, and identify the ones with Skype accounts).  Very helpful ... particularly when I have over 900 GMail contacts.

In November or December 2007, this feature ceased to be functional (though you wouldn't know it from the Skype website).  Instead, when I now try to import contacts from GMail, I receive a message that "Skype could not find any contacts from your address books" ... and offering to "Click here to add people to your contact list manually" .... riiiight!!  See the attached image.

The loss of functionality appeared to occur coincident with the late 2007 GMail interface upgrade (which I don't use) ... though the two aren't necessarily related.

I wrote Skype tech support, and received the advice to remove and reinstall Skype.  Sure. What I didn't tell them is that I am experiencing this behavior on three different machines: two that are XP (one of which is at the office, and maintained by the IT Department) and 1 that is Vista. 

Hard to believe that "reinstall Skype" is the solution (it wasn't). I've searched the Skype forums, and others have experienced the same problem (the nasty workaround is to export your contacts from GMail to Outlook, and then do an import from there).

Each time there is a new version of Skype, I keep hoping that the problem will be fixed.  Nope.

Rebecca before 33 days on the road for Skype

Skype Nomad's a nice mix of reality programming, travel porn, product field test, and marketing stunt. Rebecca Campbell, 26, is in motion for 33 days, going around the world Eastward from London. She's blogging her journey and posting updates flickr (you gotta see her photos), facebook, twitter (via Nokia N95), Dopplr and MySpace.

Skype had a smaller role in last summer's Blue Planet Run, a multi-country athletic event.

Titles worse than Skype Nomad: "Trolling for Outlets", "Bandwidth Tourism", "Around the World 47 Days Faster Than Phileas Fogg", "Eat, Pray, Skype", "Realtime Travel Voyeurism", "Exercises in Sleep Deprivation". 

This is a simple, direct, promotion. It brings Skype into the real world, away from desks and offices.

So far Rebecca's been to Singapore, Beijing, Yi Chang, Chongqing. (Did you know China has more Skype users than any other country?) Coming up:

• Guangzhou on May 12th
• Hong Kong from May 12th to 13th
• Perth on May 14th
• Kalgoorlie on May 15th

More points in Australia. Then California and Alaska. England, France, Italy, Austria, Germany, Sweden, ending in Estonia.

I've been resisting this because, after all, it's a corporate publicity gimmick. And I'm no sucker, right?

Right. But this must be what they mean by PR 2.0.

It was very low key. Nobody pitched me. Nomad Ground Control built Skype Nomad's social media persona across multiple networks. Buzz reaches me naturally, through people I know, in contexts I trust.

Because it engages with the real world, the outcomes are unpredictable, so there's suspense, and news. It builds to a climax at the end: will she be able to finish? On time?

The stream of updates lets people identify with Rebecca and meet other fans. This 800-hour-long event also builds up critical mass, as word of mouth spreads.

I've been sucked in to the experience. Ducking security at an airport. Taking a boat up the Yangtze River. Food Porn. People watching. Trouble squatting on a train. It's fun, tiring, gritty, with a host who's ready for the challenge.

See also:

Jan Geirnaert on Rebecca's confused Skypephone presence.

Jim Courtney on Connecting and Enabling the Global Nomad.

The German appeals court almost ruled against Skype today in Skype vs. GPL before Skype withdrew the appeal of its July 2007 conviction. Skype was convicted of not following the software license that comes with Linux. Skype used Linux in PC-free Wi-Fi phones.

No news release from Skype on this. No word from Skype on what they, their suppliers, and their distributors will do to comply with the GPL, or when.

Continue reading "Skype caves on GPL appeal" »

Enough said.

We have previously posted about Jonathan Christensen's presentation at eComm 2008; here and here. As well we have referenced the transcript here. This past week eComm 2008 producer Lee Dryburgh was able to make available videos of the presentation. If you want to learn about the evolution of VoIP and how the conditions were ripe for the successful launch of Skype in the fall of 2003 as well as a discussion of the seeds of mobile Skype, take 30 minutes to watch it.

For easy follow along we have reposted the accompanying slides: (Power Point version here).

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Last fall I reviewed Convenos Meeting Center, positioning it as "Your Conference Board Room on the Internet":

Convenos Meeting Center is a complete conference sharing collaborative environment suitable for both ad hoc and scheduled meetings as well as a virtual meeting room for "persistent", project-dedicated business activities such as key account sales strategizing or product management support.

I mentioned, however, that one shortcoming was that its Application Sharing was sluggish and found that Convenos only officially supported Internet Explorer as its platform. Last month Convenos released an upgrade that:

• has "lightning-fast" Application Sharing
• supports Firefox as a browser platform
• is Microsoft Vista tolerant (sessions have been known to run successfully on Vista platforms; they just are not sure they have found all the "gotchas".)
• reduces installation time by about 50%
• provides enhanced Outlook support for scheduling meetings

I did some basic application sharing tests this week and can report that the Application Sharing is very fast -- even transmitting some video (but not audio) from the PGA Tour site. Convenos incorporated a "mirror server" into their collaboration architecture to accomplish this.

As a default Firefox browser user, login to, and operation of, my ongoing "Test" Convenos Meeting Room worked just fine. One of the Convenos support staff, who served as another meeting participant during my trial session mentioned above, related a CMC experience where he did not realize two of the participants were on Vista until they mentioned it well into the session. On the other hand they want to do further testing before claiming full Vista compatibility.

If you are currently a Convenos user the upgrade will be offered automatically when you next log into your Convenos subscription. Should you encounter any difficulties with this route, then simply Uninstall your previous installation, reboot your PC and log back, you will have a successful upgrade. The end result performance is definitely worth taking the time to upgrade.

Convenos can be accessed either as an independent browser-based Windows application or as a Skype Extra as a complement to Skype conversations. The Convenos Meeting Center Extra, which recently received Skype certification, provides a complete "instant meeting" Convenos web conferencing mode which incorporates the upgraded Application Sharing . .

And in the same April Convenos newsletter, they remind of the "Green" benefit of collaboration in addition to the well-known cost and productivity benefits:

Did you know that aviation is the world's fastest growing man-made source of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and is a major contributor to global warming? Per PlanetArk, 16,000 commercial airplanes release 600 million tons of carbon dioxide every year. A recent survey conducted by a leading unified communications consultancy group revealed that 70% of organizations surveyed rated "reducing organizational carbon footprints" as a key driver in their decision to invest in web conferencing and collaboration.

In these times of rapidly rising fuel prices, one more consideration for using collaboration tools.

Tags: Convenos, Convenos Meeting Center, application sharing, Skype Extras, Convenos Meeting Center Extra

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Last year while in Hannover, my glasses lost a hinge screw which caused a lens to fall out. It was mid-evening with all the optical stores closed; I had to catch an early morning train to Cologne. Fortunately, aided by my Swiss Army knife, a micro-surgically-adept colleague at dinner was able to figure out how to put it back together or I may have missed seeing a lot of European countryside the next day. In 1996 Paul Lantinga, a Toronto native, was on an IT consulting assignment in India and lost his glasses to a surfing wave and had fuzzy vision until he could find an optometrist who could create a new pair.

During the same assignment he came across a pair of prescription goggles that swimmers could wear instead of standard eyeglasses. But they were made in Taiwan and not found anywhere when he later returned to North America. According to a story earlier this week in the Globe and Mail Report on Business, he was so impressed that he recognized the geographical market opportunity and, in 2005, founded a distributorship, See Worthy, Inc. based out of Toronto, for importing these glasses into Canada, U.S. and the Caribbean. Combining scenarios of beaches at water's edge, he branded the glasses Sable Water Optics.

Having been an IT consultant, Paul understood the support that technology could provide to his fledgling business. His priorities were on inventory control, sales management, marketing through a website as well as communications. His employees were distributed around North America and Paul was doing a lot of traveling. So the Internet, along with Blackberries, became a key piece of his business infrastructure. An associate modified an inventory management application to provide data access via the Internet; Salesforce.com became his customer relationship management backbone.

With a geographically disbursed sales team and distributor base and a supplier in Taiwan and European expansion plans, he turned to Skype to help cut his long-distance bills. Introducing Skype was a transitional process but it eventually worked its way into becoming a key communications tool. In fact, when I first talked to him yesterday he had just finished a 30 minute Skype conference call with his Sales VP in Osaka, Japan and a financial manager in Michigan. From the story:

Keeping in touch with his far-flung staff is another top priority. See Worthy is a small company, but it's spread out: Lantinga is in Toronto; his vice-president of sales lives in Iowa; most of his sales representatives are in the U.S.; his supplier is located in Taiwan. And the company is looking to expand to Europe. That all adds up to huge long-distance phone bills. To help cut costs, Lantinga turned to Skype, an Internet telephony application that allows him to talk to non-Skype users for pennies a minute.

The system's Internet-based applications sure come in handy when Lantinga needs to talk to his supplier in Taiwan, who speaks only Mandarin. Lantinga Skypes his translator in Lethbridge, Alberta, who then gets the supplier on the line. While the translator is talking to Taiwan, she can send questions and information to Lantinga using Skype's instant-message function, and get immediate replies. Engaged in a three-way global conversation, they discuss orders, deadlines and prices.

Lantinga also regularly uses Skype to talk to an optical-technology company in France and to potential distributors across Europe as See Worthy prepares to expand overseas.

And talking about Skype's most prominent endorser, Oprah; Sable Water Optics hit the O List in Oprah Magazine last month. Going forward Paul is looking at ways of building out his communications infrastructure to further reduced his communications bill while responding to the demands of a growing business.

Tags: Skype, See Worthy Inc., Paul Lantinga, Sable Water Optics

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