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Om Malik sums up the problems over at Joost quite well... The company is having a large round of layoffs and is losing the video war to Hulu and others. While Om explains all the factors which led to the company's demise such as their rapid growth, lack of focus and geographic distribution, I wonder if the biggest problem isn't the lack of intriguing or popular content (which he points out and elaborates on). The few times I used the service I was amazed at how little interesting content it had.

Personally, I would use an inferior service to view better content any day. I suppose many viewers would agree with me on this point.

A long while back Niklas Zennstrom mentioned that there could be a future tie-in between Joost and Skype. This may have helped a few years back but at this point it is too late.

Then again Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis, Skype's founders still own some of the technology which runs the world's most popular internet telephony service and they have threatened to pull the plug on Skype. The impending lawsuit is even threatening the upcoming Skype IPO. Perhaps there will be a settlement which includes Skype/Joost integration?

One of the great things about this entry from Om is the list of mistakes Joost made. I recommend all tech entrepreneurs or those affected by technology read the piece so history doesn't repeat itself.

See Also:

Joost Changes Business Model

 

Broadband connectivity - it has become like air to me. I suffocate when I don't have it and the faster the broadband access I have, the better I feel. So when I enter a restaurant and the WiFi is on but locked I just go crazy. I have become so accustomed to having fast broadband access everywhere, I just can't understand when a restaurant doesn't provide it. Worse yet is having a WiFi signal with an SSID with the name of a restaurant and a locked signal.

Restaurant owners are better off leaving the ID as Linksys or Netgear or just making something up like "Have a nice day."

Recently my travel department was instructed by me that my flights must all have WiFi on them. That means I cancelled flights I would have taken on American Airlines and JetBlue in favor of Virgin America because with this carrier, WiFi is guaranteed. Of course this applies to domestic flights for now.

Yes, WiFi is now more important to me than frequent flyer miles. Who would have thought? Wow!

I see this trend eventually hitting restaurants. Already, TMC group lunches where work needs to be done typically take place where WiFi is available.

In a time when many CLECs have been wiped out, how has one competitive local exchange carrier survived and found a way to grow in one of the toughest business environments of our lifetimes? To find out more I interviewed Chris Barton, CEO & President - Wholesale Carrier Services (WCS) in order to learn what his company is doing. More importantly, Barton gives tremendous insight on where he thinks the economy is headed and how channel partners, VARs and agents need to adapt to survive in what is a turbulent market for resellers everywhere.  

The advent of the internet, SIP trunking, intense competition and the economic downturn has contributed to changing the channel partner market forever and if you are doing the same things you always did as a channel partner you may get wiped off the earth in the next few years. You need to change. How? Well I would spoil it if I told you and didn't allow you to listen to the podcast which is complete and dare I say elaborate. It is worth a listen if you are in any segment of the telecom or technology spaces and the lessons you can learn here are applicable to other segments of the market.

On Thursday of this week I will be at one of my favorite events - the CBX conference in New York where I will be interviewing some of the best and brightest in the data communications space. The event is hosted by Telx, a leader in the carrier hotel, data center and colocation spaces (Telx is also sponsor of the popular collocation community on TMCnet). Many of the companies in attendance at this invitation-only event are Telx customers looking to do business with one another. A bunch of well-known tech companies will be there as well such as China Telecom, NTT Communications, Force 10, Adva, Ciena, Cisco and more.

 

Personally I learn a great deal from this event and have attended it for many years. The companies there are on the front lines of bandwidth allocation and they know the trends in the market before they become widely known by those outside the industry. I look to this event as a barometer to the future of the internet - what is happening with IPV6? Do we really have a fiber glut? Is bandwidth demand still increasing in this economy? What is the real effect of all those smartphones on data demand?

The 2009 Customer Business Exchange is an invitation‐only networking event designed to help grow our customers' business. This years event will take place in New York City, NY, one of the largest telecommunication hubs in North America.
 

Hundreds of decision‐makers will gather, showcase new and existing products and services, and close deals. This event is unique in that all the network operators that are exhibitors and sponsors have direct capacity available to deliver from a Telx facility today. This makes the Telx CBX a highly targeted and relevant event.

The 2008 CBX event touted 1000 c-level and other senior-level executive attendees that representing 458 companies in 21 countries around the world. CBX attendees are focused on creating new business opportunities that will extend networks, facilitate faster data transfers, add new services and grows businesses organically. And due to overwhelming early demand and our Meet Me Room expansions, we expect this year's event to attract a record‐number of industry leaders and executives.

Enterprise customers will find considerable opportunities for business growth and expansion at CBX as well; those needing the services of a variety of carriers or service providers can meet all of their needs by choosing Telx and its partners. In addition, each industry including Financial Services can benefit from an ecosystem of providers targeted to meet the industry's specific needs. For example, financial service customers will enjoy particular benefits, as a variety of financial service providers, networks, and exchanges attend CBX.

Thursday, June 25, 2009   8:30 AM  -  9:00 AM CBX Registration Opens

All Guests must first check-in to receive their name badges before entering the 2009 CBX

9:00 am - 10:00 am - Session # 1 - Topic: Broadband Stimulus Plan

• Michael Romano, Of Counsel, Bingham McCutchen LLP

10:20 am - 11:20 am - Session # 2 - Topic: Advanced Video Networks

• Howard Lichtman, President, Human Productivity Lab
• John Bartlett, Principal, NetForecast
• Jason Redisch, Principal Architect, Virtela Communications
• Monty Richardson, Business Development Specialist, IPV Gateways
• Marc Trachtenberg, CEO, Teliris
• Chris Carr, Global Director, Masergy 
• James Peters, Senior Director, Cisco   

11:40 am - 12:30 pm - Session # 3 - Topic: Staying Ahead of the Low Latency Curve

• Pete Harris, President, A-Team Group
• Mark Casey, President, CFN Services
• Scott Caudell, CTO, 7Ticks
• Noah Lieske, CEO, Xasax Corporation
• Nelson Frye, Director of Product, Telx
  
• Shawn Kaplan, Director of Business Development, Activ Financial

10:00 AM  -  10:10 AM Opening Remarks by the CEO

Mr. Eric Shepcaro, the CEO and Chairman of the Board of Telx, welcomes guests and invites them to maximize the networking opportunities available at the CBX.

10:10 AM  -  10:20 AM CBX Door Prize & Wine Basket Giveaways

 

Respective sponsor pick and announce winners to claim their prize at the podium

Eric Shepcaro, Telx CEO and Chairman of the Board invites CEO, CIO, CTO, and CFO representatives to take a seat at the CXO Roundtable on June 25th, 2009. This Roundtable is Invitation ONLY.

 

With unlimited drinks and hors d'oeuvres, all attendees are encouraged to network and do business with one another.

12:00 PM  -  4:00 PM CBX Pre-Arranged One-on-One Meetings

A room on the far right of the exhibit area is reserved for Telx customer announcements. Don't miss your opportunity to get the first scoop on major news and mingle with representatives from the nation's premier technology publications

Join us at the Broadway Lounge of The Marriott Marquis - 8th Floor for Live Music, Lite Appetizers and Open Bar!!!

Better M&A, management and marketing skills always win the war

As Ron Gruia pointed out this morning, the Nortel fire sale continues and a once-great company with a market cap of $250 billion is effectively being sold off at bargain-basement prices. In fact NSN picked up the ailing Canadian company's CDMA and LTE business for about one times revenue or $650 million. At this rate the entire company will be sold off for a total of $2 billion. The silver lining in this dark news is that customers will be able to have a solid company behind them in NSN and thankfully at least 2,500 employees working in Canada, the U.S., Mexico and China will be able to maintain their jobs working for NSN.

As a show of support for the deal, EDC or Export Development Canada is throwing in $300 million toward an NSN credit facility - a full 10x more than the agency was willing to commit to Nortel!

For NSN the deal means a stronger North American presence and also they go from not having a CDMA business to becoming number two. They will have to work hard to maintain this business as Asian rivals are coming on strong. An additional benefit of the deal is a number of LTE patents, technology and expertise which will come in very handy as the world transitions to faster wireless broadband networks.

I have seen some surmise Nortel went down because of open source and the Internet and to some degree this is part of the problem. But perhaps the biggest problem at Nortel was failure to adjust to a market that moves faster than ever coupled with the inability to effectively integrate acquired companies. Some Nortel employees told me the company was too flexible with the companies they acquired and should have set tougher rules regarding integration.

The major take away from this ordeal is how a company with superior technology got beaten by other companies with inferior technology but better M&A, management and marketing skills. At the end of the day the products are important but as Nortel continues to show us, having great technology alone does not a long-term successful strategy make.

There is so much fanfare about the Apple iPhone 3G S so I went to the Orange store here in Nice, France to check the lines. It was slow and steady with people coming in and asking about the phone during the 30 minutes or so I surveyed the store. The phone itself is certainly faster than the standard 3G model with an upgraded graphics chip, processor and as a bonus, the procesore runs about 50% faster than the old one and there is more system RAM.

Having used the new iPhone OS 3.0 for about a week I can tell you it is much better than the old version allowing email push as well as landscape typing in email. I have noticed that the browser does not seem as fast as the previous OS and it takes longer to resolve email addresses when sending messages.

Other issues that need resolving include multitasking -- you still can't listen to music from the new Sirius XM app and respond to email for example. I also wonder why there is no spell check in email, why you can't set email priority, return receipt, etc. And what about storing files locally from email attachments?

I could go on but it seems that the device has such a cult following it doesn't need all the bells and whistels at once. Over time it will will improve and keep the competition on its toes. From where I stand the app store is still the biggest differentiator and RIM, Nokia, Microsoft, Palm and the rest need successful app stores to compete effectively with Apple. After all, you just can't compete with Apple if they are raking in money hand over fist from the devices and the apps. Just as the PC market showed us in decades past, its the Apps stupid.

I have always been proud to be an American for a number of reasons including the fact that our great country has almost always pushed for human rights and democracy around the world. Like any country, we are not perfect but at the end of the day there is a reason some of the best and brightest flock to the United States to live.

I am prouder still that technology which was primarily developed in the US, the internet, social networking and more recently twitter have allowed people around the world to communicate more effectively.

Most recently twitter has been responsible for communications in Iran at a time when the government there has been trying to clamp down on communications.

My family comes from Iran but I was born in the US. The country claims to have the best of both worlds - a democracy which is intertwined with religion. In many respects this solution is much better than a dictatorship but if elections are not free, the country becomes ever-closer to dictatorship than a republic.

So news of twitter aiding in communications during political protests is very exciting to me. At the end of the day every country must comply with the wishes of its people. Repressive regimes know this and censor various websites and technologies to keep democracy from taking root but in the end, the free flow of information via the web and new technologies becomes more and more difficult to stop.

And as this information flows, so does the hope for more people to gain human rights and freedom.

I have to admit I was impatient and when I learned I could follow some easy steps to upgrade to the shipping version of the iPhone 3.0 software before the June 17 general availability date -- I just had to try it. Of course it helped to have fellow TMC blogger Tom Keating there to step me through the process. You see Tom wrote a piece yesterday detailing exactly what you need to do to get ahead of the pack and be the first in your neighborhood to type emails on your iPhone in landscape mode.

The instructions are here but I should warn you that although the process is dead easy it can take many hours to go through the upgrade. It took me about six hours for the new OS to be downloaded, the software to be restored, the apps to be loaded, the podcasts to be downloaded and the photos to be synced. Then again I have thousands of contacts and photos and over 50 applications.

Apple has done a wonderful job of backing up and restoring the iPhone devices so OS upgrades are smooth. However, one past pain point of iPhone OS upgrades was having to reenter the WEP keys needed for secure WiFi. To my happy surprise I didn't have to reenter a single WEP key as a result of this upgrade.

So is the upgrade worth it? I have to say yes. The push email works great and the landscape keyboard in email makes typing on this device infinitely better. It is also less clunky when sending a URL to someone as in the past you had to switch from landscape to portrait when opening the email application for a send. In addition, when looking at a list of emails you can now tell which is a Cc, Bcc or direct send which is signified by a "To" symbol. Ironically there is no Bcc symbol meaning if there is no symbol you have been Bcced. This is an important addition to the OS as quite often mobile devices make it more difficult to know if you have been Bcced meaning users can accidentally reply to all without realizing they probably shouldn't.

There is also MMS support but this won't work on AT&T Wireless for now. Copy and paste is a much-needed function and works as advertised - the fact that one of the most advanced smartphones on the market "forgot" to add cut and paste sooner still baffles me and I am sure I will be telling my grandkids about it someday.

Spotlight search is another much-needed function - especially when you realize there is no way to organize applications, and is activated when you scroll all the way to the left from the home page. Searches will sift through contacts, programs, calendar, email, songs and other data on the phone but unlike the Palm Pre will not check the web if the device search comes back empty.

Voice Memos are a great addition allowing you to record your voice and send the recordings via email if desired. Third-party apps did this in the past but like many other operating systems, upgrades entail taking popular software packages and replicating their functionality.

The calendar has been improved as well with the ability to add repeating reminders but these are limited to fixed time periods like every week, 2 weeks, month or year. Ideally you would be allowed to enter recurring reminders for selected days - like every Monday or the first Wednesday of the month. In addition - what if someone wants a three-week reminder? You may think at first that they just don't have three-week recurring meetings in Cupertino... The reality of course is this was a design decision which gives most of the functionality you need in a clear and uncluttered interface.

Then there are calendar reminders... I would have preferred to have the ability to set a reminder more than two-days before an appointment and a version 3.0 upgrade would have been a great opportunity to add this option. Microsoft Windows Mobile has had this ability for years so there seems to be no technical reason to exclude such a feature.

Safari is supposed to be faster and it may be I haven't been able to verify this- likely because with push email turned on the device is constantly getting new emails so I am getting less processor for my foreground applications. I did check out the browser's ability to remember passwords - this worked out fine and is a welcome addition.

Internet tethering could not be tested because AT&T doesn't allow this functionality. I will be in Europe tomorrow and if the carrier allows it I will give this a try. I gave Bluetooth stereo a shot and found it paired with both the Plantronics Pulsar 590 stereo headphones and Sharper Image Bluetooth Speakers. For some reason the sound would not come out of the Sharper Image speakers but the Plantronics headset worked fine.

Other functions such as accessing multiple iTunes accounts, shake to shuffle, notes syncing, syncing multiple email folders and YouTube login were not tried. Remote wiping wasn't tried either for obvious reasons.

Apple took a very good phone and made it much better with this upgrade. Typing emails in landscape mode is a veritable pleasure compared to portrait and when you combine this function with cut and paste and push email the iPhone becomes a more credible corporate smartphone meaning Palm, Nokia, Microsoft and RIM have more to worry about.

So now heavy iPhone users probably don't need to be concerned about the keyboard as much as before but they will need to start thinking about spare external batteries. The reason is simple. The iPhone 3.0 is more usable and with push email and bluetooth stereo enabled, you can expect even less battery life.

It is worth explaining that Windows Mobile also drains battery life quickly for heavy email users in push mode. The alternative is RIM devices which do much better in push mode and are optimized in many ways to maximize battery life regardless of mode.

Should you upgrade? Yes. Should you do it early? That is up to you but you should be really happy with the new iPhone 3.0 software, it is a winner.

Having never had a chance to write a review about a satellite phone I was pretty motivated to respond yes to the good people at Iridium when they asked if I wanted to run their newest device the 9555 phone through its paces. In order to do a thorough review I took it with me on my travels and made calls in various places where there was typically no cell coverage.

The device itself won't get mistaken for an iPhone - it is many times thicker and has a smaller black and white screen. But what it does do better than any gadget you might read about on popular gadget sites is work everywhere - except indoors. It is a bulletproof device which was designed with users in mind. Iridium execs explain that reliability is key with this phone and so is durability.

It seems like it is made of the same material as the black box on an airplane.

It is also interesting to note that when a company is sure about their market they can really cater to it. The evidence is the company's terminology in their brochure:

 THE ULTIMATE SATELLITE PHONE

The Iridium 9555 is the ultimate in dependable mobile communications. It is a ruggedly built tool, not a toy. It won't play games, take pictures, or play MP3s. What it will do is work. Everywhere. Without exception. Small, sleek and easy to use, it is waterproof and dust and shock resistant. Engineered to withstand the world's toughest environments, Iridium phones have never been more efficient, reliable and effective.

When you open the box the phone comes in you are presented with adapters for every country in the world and just trying to figure out which would work in Sardinia presented me with a challenge. Hint - it was of the two-prong variety.

Here are some shots of the Iridium 9555 from Sardinia

So is it easy to use? Dead easy, yes. I was impressed with the call quality and it even worked when I went indoors - as long as there wasn't a lot of steel over my head. There is also data modem connectivity I didn't get a chance to try.

Other than that there are the standard mobile phone features like SMS, voicemail, address books, etc.

As you might expect, Iridium hasn't launched an app store but one wonders if there isn't an opportunity for specialized applications pertaining to the markets they cater to such as military, oil and gas, etc.

If I had to ask for more features, a camera would be high on my list as sending MMS messages from remote locations back to the home office could be useful. Video too is another area the company will have to deal with eventually as there may be an opportunity to stream video or send clips in places only this device has connectivity.

Other than that, the Iridium 9555 just plain works. It's looks won't make you the envy of the patrons of your favorite bar or dance club but you will certainly be the popular one later that evening when the party moves to a place with poor or no cell phone reception.

He laid the foundation for IPTV delivery and assembled a major force in the cellular industry via AT&T Wireless.

His masterful ability to manage a company which grew through acquisition is unparalleled. Before changing the name to AT&T, SBC was a major lobbying force and by taking out AT&T through acquisition they actually removed the competitive lobbyists from pushing regulation which would have hurt CLECs such as SBC. The move was genius.

The man has passion. I have never interviewed him but in a Businessweek article he gave an emotion-packed explanation of what he feels about Google and how they won't be allowed to use his pipes for free. I admire the passion and enthusiasm. I don' think the comments he made were in the consumer's best interest but as a man managing a publicly traded company he did right by shareholders with these comments.

If we look to GM we have a company that like AT&T was part of a duopoly. The difference is as soon as competition emerged the company folded like a poker player with a bad hand.

For too many years GM had lousy management and created cars that for lack of a better word sucked. Americans ran away from Detroit automobiles like AT&T ran away from VoIP in the nineties.

What GM needs is a leader who can make a company run lean and mean while remaining nimble. Somehow this is not what I think of when I hear AT&T. This doesn't mean Whitacre can't do the job it just means whoever chose Whitacre apparently has no idea what skills the new lader needs.

We are in an age where speed in business is becoming the differentiator between success and failure. It took decades for GM to launch the Japanese fighting Saturn brand and it had the potential to change the Detroit vs. Japan fight if executed correctly. Now Saturn is being sold off like scrap metal.

I have to admit I don't know Whitacre but admire what he has built. But what I have read about the man leads me to believe he is destined for colossal failure if for no other reason than he seems computer illiterate. According to BusinessWeek he doesn't use a computer. Here is a direct quote from the man:

''I'm not computer illiterate, but I'm close. If two people are sitting 20 feet from each other and sending each other E-mails, I think that's ridiculous.''

Uh, hello - and you ran a company which allowed the world to use email and text messaging to dramatically increase their productivity?

GM needs better car designers. They need someone to stand up to the unions and restructure compensation so that it is not on par with the Japanese - but far lower because the Chinese are coming.

The things GM needs are speed, quality, public relations and lower costs. Whitacre will bring an amazing ability to do deals and manage M&A as well as the skills to convince the government to do whatever he wants.

But do we need an M&A guru to turn GM around? I don't think so. What should scare you to death is that our government seems to be writing blank checks to GM already. Wait till there are even more skillful lobbyists in place.. We can all expect to sign a few paychecks a year over the "Government Motors."

This move I fear will be terrible for US taxpayers because I can't see how Whitacre will be able to dig GM out of the hole they've already created for themselves.

Having said that the task is monumental and I hope I am wrong.