VOIP News

You may have seen my recent blog post about what we learned from the Skype outage. I have had much feedback about this article and I found it important enough to publish in an upcoming TMC magazine. I won’t tell you which as I would like you to read them all of course.

 One of the letters I received regarding the post was actually something the author allowed me to publish. The quantity of mail I receive where the author wants me not to publish the comments is astounding actually. The e-mail below agrees with my thoughts regarding the Skype outage and since it comes from Ixia, a testing company no one should be surprised. It was sent by Rob Adler one of the best of the best in PR.  Here is the letter: 

Hi Rich, FYI. Your article was the subject of much discussion at Ixia. I thought that you might be interested in a comment from Pierre Lynch who is director of wireless and IMS at Ixia: The recent problems with Skype underline the fact that IP communications is growing more complex and interrelated. Seemingly innocent changes can have untended and significant effects.  VoIP, by its nature, is more vulnerable to negative impacts because it runs on a converged network along with a myriad of other services and functions. Never before would an Operating System security patch cause a large VoIP service disruption. * Any change to the entire configuration, not just the VoIP functions themselves, needs to be tested before it is deployed. That’s why testing is so critical to keep a business up and running. Hope all is well with you.  Best, RobRobert Adler

PR@vantage - Communicating Technology

 Again this highlights the need to be proactive when deploying IP communications. You will find Ixia and hundreds of other companies in the IP communications space at ITEXPO in a few weeks in Los Angeles, CA. I hope to see you all there.



Tags: ip communications, ixia, pierre lynch, pr, public relations, rich tehrani, rob adler, skype, testing, voip

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There are some management changes at Alcatel-Lucent consisting of COO Frank D’Amelio and President Mike Quigley leaving. Patricia Russo will remain as CEO and Etienne Fouques, who had reported to

Quigley, will now lead the company’s tech and strategy unit and oversee the services group.

Also, Michel Rahier was given charge of the company’s telecom business, including wireless and converged network gear. More.



Tags: Alcatel-Lucent, Etienne Fouques, Frank D’Amelio, ims, ip communications, Michel Rahier, Patricia Russo, service provider, voip

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Today Google announced its Google Earth program will allow you navigate stars as well. You can now see constellations and navigate around the cosmos. You can see how planets rotate using an animation tool and more. Here are some of the neat things the program will let you do: Constellations — From Cassiopeia to Andromeda, the Constellations layer connects the points of constellations through space, labeling each with its given name. Users can learn about the stars that make up their favorite constellations.



Backyard Astronomy – The Backyard Astronomy layer lets users click through a variety of placemarks and information on stars, galaxies, and nebulae visible to the eye, binoculars and small telescopes. This layer is useful for the amateur astronomer who may benefit from a comprehensive, organized way to reference fragments of the night sky.

Hubble Space Telescope Imagery – The HST layer provides users with over 120 high-resolution images provided by the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA/ESA’s renowned orbiting telescope.

Moon — The Moon layer displays animations of two months of both lunar positions and moon phases.

Planets — The Planets layer illustrates the seven official planets and their positions in the sky two months into the future.

Users Guide to Galaxies – The Users Guide to Galaxies layer enables users to go on virtual tours through different types of galaxies, from Ursa Minor Dwarf to the Milky Way.

Life of a Star – The Life of a Star layer takes the user on a tour through the different stages of a star’s life cycle. If you are like me you are wondering when you will not only be able to zoom around the stars online but do it in person in a spacecraft. This of course brings to light a new telecom problem our kids will face. Will there be good cell phone coverage in space? Will they use GSM? Will the iPhone work? Another important question is whether network neutrality will apply once you pass the moon? Will the FCC have to re-auction all frequencies once again? Will Russia plant a titanium flag on the moon meaning they own all the airwaves beyond the Earth? But before we get too bogged down on communications in space, we should make sure we are communicating well here on Earth. For example how is mobility going here in the US? Better than expected? Is there room for improvement? I started to think about this topic as I read Greg Galitzine’s ideas on the matter where he discusses some whitepapers worth reading.

See a video touting Google Earth’s new “Sky” features in version 4.2.



Tags: apple, earth, Google, Greg Galitzine, iphone, mobility, stars, sun, tmc, white paper

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If you live vicariously through my travel schedule then you were with me in Arizona during that muggy and super-hot trip I took a while back to see Oaisys and learn about their Talkument voice appliance. As you may recall, Talkument makes voicemail as useful as e-mail with the ability to annotate them or even pieces of these voice messages. Here is a full feature list: 

• Voice Document Sharing — Allows users to share voice documents with other authorized users and temporary guest users.
• Highlighting — Selected segments of the voice document can be highlighted so whoever is authorized to review the file can simply listen to the pertinent segment and not have to wade through the entire file. 
• Commenting — An annotation feature helps the user tag certain documents for future retrieval. These comments are visible for other authorized users to facilitate collaboration and communication. 
• File Management System — Talkument also allows users to store the voice files in its file management system, which contains folders that can be custom-configured and personalized to make it easy to find files at a later date. 
• Collaboration — As a collaboration tool, Talkument helps teams be more effective in their communications by allowing them to review and comment upon the voice documents together or separately. 
• Security — Talkument voice documents are securely stored on the Talkument appliance. All voice playbacks are delivered through encrypted file streaming with root voice documents never being downloaded or sent to the users.

 The big news from Oaisys is that the Talkument product will be resold by Toshiba Authorized Dealers now. The two companies have worked together before via an ACD deal this past May. Today’s news seems to be a strengthening of the relationship and I think it is a smart move for Toshiba to be working with Oaisys and carrying the Talkument product line.



Tags: annotation, Oaisys, Talkument, unified messaging, voicemail

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In previous posts it was mentioned that Skype blames Microsoft for the recent outage it had last week. More recently Skype has issued a statement saying it does not diectly blame Microsoft for the problem but instead it clarified the Microsoft update patches caused a chain reaction which caused their network to fail. Here are the details:

1. Are we blaming Microsoft for what happened?

We don’t blame anyone but ourselves. The Microsoft Update patches were merely a catalyst — a trigger — for a series of events that led to the disruption of Skype, not the root cause of it. And Microsoft has been very helpful and supportive throughout.

The high number of post-update reboots affected Skype’s network resources. This caused a flood of log-in requests, which, combined with the lack of peer-to-peer network resources at the time, prompted a chain reaction that had a critical impact. The self-healing mechanisms of the P2P network upon which Skype’s software runs have worked well in the past. Simply put, every single time Skype has needed to recover from reboots that naturally accompany a routine Windows Update, there hasn’t been a problem.

Unfortunately, this time, for the first time, Skype was unable to rise to the challenge and the reasons for this were exceptional. In this instance, the day’s Skype traffic patterns, combined with the large number of reboots, revealed a previously unseen fault in the P2P network resource allocation algorithm Skype used. Consequently, the P2P network’s self-healing function didn’t work quickly enough. Skype’s peer-to-peer core was not properly tuned to cope with the load and core size changes that occurred on August 16. The reboots resulting from software patching merely served as a catalyst. This combination of factors created a situation where the self-healing needed outside intervention and assistance by our engineers.

2. What was different about this set of Microsoft update patches?

In short – there was nothing different about this set of Microsoft patches. During a joint call soon after problems were detected, Skype and Microsoft engineers went through the list of patches that had been pushed out. We ruled each one out as a possible cause for Skype’s problems. We also walked through the standard Windows Update process to understand it better and to ensure that nothing in the process had changed from the past (and nothing had). The Microsoft team was fantastic to work with, and after going through the potential causes, it appeared clearer than ever to us that our software’s P2P network management algorithm was not tuned to take into account a combination of high load and supernode rebooting.

3. How come previous Microsoft update patches didn’t cause disruption?

That’s because the update patches were not the cause of the disruption. In previous instances where a large number of supernodes in the P2P network were rebooted, other factors of a “perfect storm” had not been present. That is, there had not been such a combination of high usage load during supernode rebooting. As a result, P2P network resources were allocated efficiently and self-healing worked fast enough to overcome the challenge.

4. Has the bug been fixed? Should Skype users worry about future Microsoft Update patches and reboots?

Yes, the bug has been squashed. The parameters of the P2P network have been tuned to be smarter about how similar situations should be handled. Once we found the algorithmic fix to ensure continued operation in the face of high numbers of client reboots, the efforts focused squarely on stabilizing the P2P core. The fix means that we’ve tuned Skype’s P2P core so that it can cope with simultaneous P2P network load and core size changes similar to those that occurred on August 16. We’d like to reassure our users across the globe that we’ve done everything we need to do to make sure this doesn’t happen again. We’ve already introduced a number of improvements to our software to ensure our users will not be similarly affected – in the unlikely possibility of this combination of events recurring.



Tags: denial of service, heartbeat, ip communications, microsoft, outage, p2p, patch, reboot, rich tehrani, Skype, supernode, tmc, tom keating, voip

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Are you looking to sue your wireless carrier? If you are you should know a full six paragraphs are dedicated to dispute resolution over at Verizon Wireless and ten “fat” paragraphs are dedicated to this topic in an AT&T Wireless bill. Interesting wording in the AT&T bill reads as follows: 

“You agree that, by entering into this Agreement, you and AT&T are each waiving the right to a trial by jury or to participate in a class action.”

 I came across a good article on this topic at Newsfactor.com. This article is where I got the figures from the first paragraph by the way. The article is a good read if this topic is of interest.



Tags: at&t, cancel, contract, lawsuit, newfactor, sue, verizon, wireless

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TMC is proud to have partnered with SightSpeed to launch a videoconferencing channel on TMCnet which is designed to bring together the community of videoconferencing decision-makers in a single location online. Expect this channel to be updated frequently and worth bookmarking to keep up to date on the latest in all things having to do with the videoconferencing space. I have selected some articles from the channel you may find interesting. 

• Report: Video Conferencing Market to Reach $11.9 Billion by 2010
• Study: Desktop Video Conferencing Makes Big Strides
• The Green Side of Video Conferencing

 Here is some of the current news from the site which could also be of interest: 

• Wind Currents Chooses Grandstream Video Phone and ATA to Create IP Solution for the Residential Market
• SipCat and Grandstream Partner to Create Auto-Configurable IPPBX Solution for the SMB Market
• Cypress Provides Top Law Firm Next-Generation VoIP Communications
• Broadcaster.com Releases ‘’Remote Video'’ Technology
• Covad Next Generation Broadband Powers Nation’s Leading WiFi Hotspots

Tags: channel, community, green, ip communications, ip pbx, SightSpeed, smb, tmc, video, videoconferencing, voip

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Jon Arnold and I were both quoted recently in a San Francisco Chronicle article titled Skype reveals outage source, tells customers it won’t happen again. The article is extremely well-written, gets perspective from a number of people and weaves each viewpoint into a cohesive whole. My quote follows below: 

The technology relies on user computers to route phone calls and handle some of the call authentication. There are thousands of computers and servers that are tapped to act as these supernodes in the Skype network. That reliance has allowed Skype, owned by San Jose’s eBay, to keep phone calls free between members and extremely cheap for calls to nonsubscribers. But an outage like last week’s reveals the inherent vulnerability in the system when a large number of computers are affected within a short span of time, said Rich Tehrani, chairman of the Internet Telephony Conference and Expo and president of TMC, a communications and technology media company. ”The fate of the users is not in the control of one company, and that’s the problem,” Tehrani said. “There is a reliance on computers that can be rebooted by any number of software systems. When you have a situation when you’re relying on computers that are not your own to keep the network up and running, you’re at their mercy.”

 I should point out that in prior writings about the Skype outage I have mentioned the fact that the company has had an excellent track record of reliability. Furthermore, while there are potential problems in p2p networks, so far the record has been fairly good. When you consider the pace of software innovation and the new features Skype continues to add to its service it is amazing just how stable the service has been. Sure the PSTN is more stable but we get a new features on the PSTN every 10 years while on Skype it seems like we get a few every month. Here is Jon Arnold’s quote: 

“As soon as people start to pay for this, they have expectations about quality, security and scalability,” said Jon Arnold, an analyst with J. Arnold and Associates. “If a business is more dependent on Skype, you need to have confidence this won’t happen again. You have to have higher standards and quality-control mechanisms.”

 Thanks to the San Francisco Chronicle for the opportunity to share my views and thanks to Ryan Kim for writing a great article.



Tags: ebay, itexpo, jon arnold, outage, p2p, pstn, rich tehrani, ryan kim, San Francisco Chronicle, Skype, tmc, voip

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If you are annoyed that your trademarks are being used on Google’s search engine to allow your competitor to profit, join the club as American Airlines is the latest company to sue Google for using its trademark inappropriately. Other companies to sue Google for the same reason are Geico and American Blind & Wallpaper Factory Inc. In every case, Google has won using the argument that placing an ad on a keyword search is analogous to running an ad from Toyota in a car magazine reviewing a Ford car. If Google was to lose such a case it would obviously be disastrous for the world’s leading search engine as this is the primary way the company generates revenue.



Tags: ads, adsense, adwords, American Airlines, American Blind & Wallpaper Factory, Geico, google

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I recently had the opportunity to speak with Erin Bolton, marketing manager of Acredo Technologies Inc, about IP communications, the company’s customer base and the upcoming ITEXPO. Acredo Technologies delivers hosted IP phone service to the small business market and the company’s mission is to “Build and manage a recognized brand in the hosted IP-Centrex space for small business in North America.” This past February TMC chose Acredo Technologies as one of the winners of its prestigious “Best of Show” at its Internet Telephony Conference & Expo. Please read more about it here. Please outline your new corporate initiatives. Acredo Technologies will provide a hosted IP phone service that small businesses can afford and manage. Acredo’s offering is a bundled solution integrating technology from our best of breed partners including Avaya, AT&T, HP, Cisco and Oracle. The partners we have chosen will allow us to create the most reliable and highest quality calling experience with VoIP technology. Acredo is making IP telephony simpler, more convenient and time saving with service to the extreme for small business.  How is IP communications changing your company’s strategy? IP communications allows integration with other applications and leverages all of a company’s technology investments. It adds productivity to everyone by simplifying and reducing the time to do many of the tasks before IP. Virtual workers are now common and mobility now has a more important part in servicing the customer. How has SIP changed communications? SIP has created a standard set of rules for telephony developers and manufacturers to adhere to, making more things possible through the integration of many products. Without SIP standards the IP network would not be able to support Telecom as we know it. What is the biggest request coming from your customer base?  The basic business telephone needs to provide small business the same capabilities that medium and large companies have with their advanced PBX systems without the complexity that requires on premises staff to maintain the system.  How are you answering their demands? Acredo is providing the closest thing to a “plug and play” solution for small business by turning VoIP into a service and bundling everything needed into one price. This approach will give small business all of the rewards and none of the risks with a “pay as you go, pay as you grow” strategy. What do you think the future of the market is?  Small businesses will do for IP telephony what they did for personal computing. Once there is a quality and affordable solution, it will become ubiquitous very quickly. How does the growth rate in the U.S. compare to the rest of the world? The U.S. may be slightly ahead in concepts and in deployment of on premise systems at the present time. At the moment there isn’t a real market leader for small businesses to follow in the hosted arena and without this it is anybody’s guess how the future will play out. What do you think of Google and Apple entering the telecom market? Non-telecom companies are somewhat inhibited by their legacy. It takes more than bright people with money to succeed in telecom. These companies will be able to come up with some interesting products, but the true winners are likely to be from the established telecom companies or new players like Acredo. How about Microsoft? Integration with Microsoft’s enterprise applications is a must, but Microsoft has misfired before in telecom with Tapi and Tapi II. Their partnerships with Avaya and Nortel along with others speak to their strategy of being a strategic component in the telephony paradigm shift to IP and the importance integration to applications will play. How will wireless technologies change our market? Mobility is still the “Killer App” of the decade. Google has nailed the issue as access to all information from any place. One example of this is the mobile phone. The access point of presence will be the mobile phone/device. How will communications evolve over the next five years? Instant communications with almost 100 percent call completion rates will drive applications and technologies to deliver increased productivity from the virtual worker and improvements in customer service. What sorts of things will we be hearing about during your presentation at ITEXPO? They will hear why the hosted environment can provide so much efficiency and value to small and medium contact centers and how to capitalize on the strengths of other hosted applications like Sales Force and Sugar CRM. Why is your presentation a “Can’t Miss?” I will present a case study that shows how the hosted PBX is changing the future of contact centers. I will show that the hosted PBX when combined with a hosted CRM is the easiest, most flexible and least expensive way for a contact center to deploy and grow. Today, the Hosted PBX can add value to companies of all sizes.  What do you want the industry to know about your company? Acredo Technologies is part of global partnership of companies that has developed our own softswitch architecture designed specifically for small business. With deployments in Japan, Acredo’s strategy is to establish the standard for quality, value and service in the hosted market for small business in North America. Please make one surprising prediction we will see in 5 year. (The Cubs will win the World Series. hehehe)  All PC’s will come VoIP enabled with soft phones.



Tags: Acredo, apple, AT&T, Cisco, communications, cubs, google, hosted, HP, itexpo, Microsoft, mike ross, on-demand, Oracle, saas, Voip

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