Recently I reported on plans for VAPPS to rebrand its business grade conference calling service as HiDefConferencing. Well last week it happened. And the plans have been renamed to Pay-As-You-Go, HiDef 10/25/50/100 and HiDef Ultra for 500 participant calls. Each plan has Unlimited minutes for those accessing the call via Skype. A new plan, High Def Toll Free can support a call of up to 500 participants @$0.07 per minute per user but with no Skype access.

So why would you use HiDef/10 when you can have ten participant conference calls within Skype. It’s about who is hosting the conference. With Skype Conference Calling, the host’s PC is hosting the call and subject to interference arising from a range of issues from connection speed and quality to PC configuration (especially processor and RAM) to giving way to Outlook downloads. With HiDef Conferencing, VAPPS is hosting the call on one of its servers which is solely dedicated to managing the call. For $25 per month you can ensure VAPPS’ business grade conferencing for up to ten participant calls.

A ten day free trial for a HiDef/25 account is available.

And recall that the reason for the HiDef rebranding is due to the service’s support of HD Voice (wideband audio) for all participants who access a call via Skype. Fewer misunderstood words, inflections and accents as well as a high quality listening experience.

Related post: HD Voice: Priceless

Tags: HiDef Conferencing, High Speed Conferencing, VAPPS Inc., Skype, Conference Calling

Mobivox is a service that let’s you make low cost or free calls worldwide at little or no cost from any phone, whether wireless or landline. Call a local access number in any of over 40 countries and tell the MobiVox Girl whom you wish to call and whether to call their home, office, mobile number or Skype. For the cost of a “local” call, you can call any Skype contact worldwide. Calls to landline and wireless numbers are charged at rates that vary by destination country but are as low as 1.9 cents per minute. (Note that calls to wireless phones outside North America have an order of magnitude higher rates due to the various mobile operators’ “caller pays” policy.)

Summary from Supplier:

Mobivox makes it possible to call family and friends around the world for free from ANY phone. No software or downloads; no hidden membership or connection fess.

.Main Website : http://www.mobivox.com

Service Features :

• Conferencing (up to ten participants)
• Group Calling (repeated calls to the same group of participants)
• Mobile to Home Phone Transfer

Programming API Available : Yes

HTML Code Snippets Available : No

Main Category : Consumer

The major new feature with the recently released Skype 3.6 for Windows is the High Quality Video (“HQV”) which provides 640 x 320 VGA resolution at 30 frames per second (“fps”). (As a reference point, my previous Logitech QuickCam for Notebooks Deluxe would only work on video calls at 320 x 240 resolution with <10 fps; even so I had reasonably good quality video especially when using SightSpeed). But this new camera along with Skype’s HQV software “changes the picture” (no pun intended) by setting new standards for video calling quality.

Logitech 9000 QuickCam Pro

A few pointers when installing:

1. Requirements: a Logitech HQV camera, Skype 3.6, broadband Internet connection (>384kbps upload) and QuickCam 11.5 software. And with four times the resolution, one needs Intel Duo Core processing power.
2. Do not install the Logitech QuickCam software provided on the CD that comes with the webcam. Go to Logitech’s website and download the version 11.5 driver for your particular camera.
3. Uninstall all previous Logitech QuickCam software, including the Camera Driver.
4. Reboot your PC and ensure you have an Internet (and, if applicable, LAN network) connection. You may find, as I did, after uninstalling the previous version 10.5 software that you no longer have any network connections for your PC. Fortunately I had encountered this issue back in June and reported on it. (Or go directly to the fix.).
5. Quit Skype and any Skype Extras and Skype partner products such as call recording, collaboration and archiving applications, etc.
6. Install the Logitech QuickCam 11.5 software (and, of course, ensure you have Skype 3.6 installed).
7. Check that the webcam is working using the Logitech QuickCam software; for the purpose of Skype video calling check out the picture with 640 x 480 (VGA) resolution. An audio tuning wizard comes up to adjust microphone, speaker and echo cancellation settings (there is a microphone is these cameras).
8. Upon launching Skype it will come up with a window announcing that it has found your High Quality Video camera and taking you directly to Skype’s Webcam Settings screen. You will also be asked to confirm that you want “Communications_Helper.exe” to link into Skype.
9. Using the webcam settings tools, adjust the zoom as well as the pan-and-tilt to obtain a satisfactory range.
10. Keep in mind that the Logitech 9000 Pro includes a microphone; installation may change your default audio mic settings (for both Windows and/or Skype).

640 x 480 High Quality Video - Skype 3.6 for Windows

Previous 320 x 240 Skype Video (prior to Skype 3.6 for Windows)

While the real test will come tomorrow when I connect with some of my Skype contacts (late Sunday evening does not find very many online), some first impressions:

• 640 x 480 vs 320 x 240 comparison; see the images. (Reduced proportionally to fit within the column width of Voice On The Web posts). Much more detail at 640 x 480.
• The Carl Zeiss Optics in the HQV cameras has a wide angle lens which provides a significantly wider viewing angle; whereas previous cameras had a much smaller viewing angle such that images that would simply cover head and shoulders at close range, the Logitech 9000 Pro showed a significant portion of my office; now I have to clean up my office.
• It takes a few minutes to “warm up” to the full video potential while making lighting adjustments using the “Right Light Sensing” feature. And the Skype video software, accessed via Tools | Options | Video Settings, appears to soften down harsh reflections (like overhead lights off an uncovered bald head) compared to using the raw QuickCam images.
• When switching to other applications, such as SightSpeed, it does require that you disable video in Skype. Speaking of SightSpeed, it only supports 320 x 240 video with the HQV cameras at this time.
• I can readily switch between Skype and SightSpeed for video calls; however, since it always uses the webcam when open I must close down SightSpeed when using Skype Video. At this point SightSpeed runs at 320 x 240 resolution with this webcam and my cable Internet service (800 kbps; it only supports 640 x 480 VGA resolution when your upload speed is over 1.5 Mbps; however, I’m sure they’re working to reduce this bandwidth demand.
• Colo(u)rs are rich and show every detail across a significant depth of field.
• Putting a business card up to the camera once again shows the versatility of the Carl Zeiss optics: at about a 6 inch (15 cm) distance, one can clearly read the card.

While Skype 3.6, etc. are required to be a “transmitter” of High Quality Video, anyone with earlier versions of Skype (at least for Windows; Mac to be verified) can view an HQV “transmission”. I did have a demonstration last week, viewing a remote party with my Skype 3.5 client, during which the video was superb quality.

At this point I simply wanted to share my installation experience. While having had a Skype video call demonstration I want feedback from a wider range of viewers; there will be more to report after doing some Skype video calls with fellow bloggers such as Phone Boy.

One question re the Mac: does the MacBook webcam have the potential to match the Logitech HQV cameras for optical quality and frame rate; HQV is a lot about the hardware optics! And the Pro 9000 requirement is for Windows XP and Windows Vista only.

Tags: Skyype, Skype 3.6, High Quality Video, Logitech, Logitech QuickCam 9000 Pro, Carl Zeiss Optics, QuickCam Drivers

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Since I last gave a complete report on SlingMedia’s various hardware platforms and the various SlingPlayers for remotely delivering your cable/satellite TV subscription to any location on the Internet with appropriate access, the SlingMedia team has been busy releasing new versions of their player. The Mac version appeared in May and last week a Symbian S60 3rd edition SlingPlayer was released as a third party application for the Nokia N-Series phones. I have been fortunate enough to have been a beta tester over the past three months for running SlingPlayer Mobile for Symbian on the widely available Nokia N95 platform whose WiFi connectivity is a key requirement for this service to operate in real time fashion.

Fundamentally the N95 supports an additional wireless protocol beyond GSM/GPRS/EDGE – namely WiFi 80211.b/g – for providing and managing Internet access via WiFi. With this WiFi support the N95 allows programs such as SlingPlayer and Truphone to readily operate in real time with minimum interference and digital pixelation or latency impact while providing very smooth output whether video or audio. I have now experienced this SlingPlayer over WiFi on the Nokia N95 during the past two months with the following comments:

In the (High Definition source) picture at the left, Canada’s premier professional golfer Mike Weir is taking his final shot of the President’s Cup 2007 held near Montreal on the 18th hole in a match with Tiger Woods. (As a result of this shot and some Tiger miscues he won the match.) The picture quality, once the SlingPlayer is connected and the cable box has been remotely powered On, is excellent, especially when considering the relative sizes of the original TV pictures, the number of compressions and decompressions it passes through in reaching the remote destination. Even works quite well at tracking high action sports such as hockey. Notice the Favorites bar which allows you to quickly access your most frequently view channels. While the Options softkey allows you to access the full set of remote control features for your cable box or PVR, you can change channels via the telephone keypad and adjust volume with the +/- switch on the N95 case.

While providing a totally satisfactory mobile TV viewing experience for carrying around the WiFi-networked house, I have found the following:

• The N95 battery life will limit baseball action to about five innings or less before requiring a recharge. In a test during the Blue Jays-Yankees 11 inning 12-11 marathon last weekend, I found a fully charged battery would die after about two hours.
• The Favorites bar needs icons for Canadian TV networks and channels.
• You will usually want to watch the action in the N95′s "Fullscreen" (landscape) mode to take maximum benefit of 4:3 or 16:9 video.
• You can reduce battery drain by using the "Audio Only" mode that simply delivers the audio feed.
• While SlingPlayer Mobile for Symbian supports GSM’s 3G HSDPA/UMTS wireless protocol, it is only recommended for users who have an unlimited wireless data plan. (For the same reasons that any VoIP does not work acceptably on 2G networks, SlingPlayer would not be appropriate on 2G.)
• My testing was not only via my home WiFi access connection but also at several remote locations while traveling in the California Bay Area last week and at a Canadian Hotspot Network access point in a Starbucks.
• Operating any other N95 application does appear to require that you turn off the SlingPlayer. For instance, attempting to perform an Outlook synchronization resulted in video interruptions.

SlingPlayer Mobile for Symbian and Truphone represent two mobile device applications that demand the bandwidth and speeds of either WiFi or 3G protocols to operate successfully. Skype Mobile for Windows is another example of a mobile device application that requires these wireless protocols. Now that Blackberry supports WiFi on their new Curve 8320 or Blackberry 8820, can Blackberry support for these three applications be far behind?

Currently SlingPlayer Mobile and Truphone give me the opportunity to take advantage of these applications, not only while carrying out tasks around the house but also at any WiFi hotspot, whether a friend’s private home, a hotel network or in a hotspot network’s retail locations (usually at lower costs than a 3G wireless data plan). And it provides one more reason to ensure that I always carry my WiFi Travel Router in my luggage. [As a footnote, this picture where the splash demonstrates the resolution quality: Woody (AquaMan) Austin demonstrates the water chip shot from a pond beside the 14th green at Royal Montreal; on the follow through he fell face first into the pond.]

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iotum introduces its Free Conference Call service for North American facebook subscribers

We’ve all been deluged over the summer with not only various services for making low cost mobile voice calls but also an avalanche of Facebook applications, most of which I have had a tendency to ignore. Occasionally there comes along a service that actually provides significant value-add to Facebook subscribers; in this case there has arrived on the scene today a service that extends the normally asynchronous Facebook dialogue amongst Facebook friends into synchronous real time "talk" conference sessions.

iotum, publisher of the Blackberry Talk-Now application for managing your interruptions, has launched for beta testing a new conference call service, Free Conference Call, for North American Facebook subscribers. Dan York, at Disruptive Telephony, goes through the details of a call setup but here’s the summary:

• Organize, schedule and create conference calls amongst both Facebook friends and "Friends not on facebook" using full Facebook event emulation including Agenda and RSVP features..
• Call notification to other participants is via both SMS and email; participants can enter the conference directly from the SMS message.
• Uses the (mobile) phone number you register on the Free Conference Call application to capture phone numbers (Facebook applications are not allowed to use any Facebook profile contact information)
• Conference calls can be private (not announced on Facebook) or public (goes up on your Facebook profile, etc.)
• All parties call into a conference bridge in area code 218 (northern Minnesota)
• Parties are recognized by their callerID; at the moment no PIN number is required but this may become an option for security reasons.
• You can call into the bridge up to 15 minutes prior to the scheduled time.
• The service itself is free; however, there may be wireless or wireline access charges to the conference bridge, depending on your individual calling plans to these services.
• There will be advertising accompanying the SMS messages.

As for iotum’s primary Relevance Engine technology: CEO Alec Saunders stated in an email today:

I know you’re probably asking “what does this have to do with the iotum Relevance Engine?”. Everything. Although our presence capabilities aren’t in the application as you will see it today, they will become part of it over time. We made a strategic decision to get to market quickly with the conferencing system, and then roll out additional features, like presence, as quickly as possible afterward. Also, later this fall the capabilities we have developed for Facebook will be re-integrated with the Talk-Now application on BlackBerry, allowing users to create instant conference calls from the BlackBerry driven by the iotum Relevance Engine. Users will be able to see at a glance who is available for a conference call, and then immediately bring all available people into that call. We’ve had interest in this feature from organizations ranging from sales groups, to political parties, IT professionals and public relations companies.

When compared with Skype’s Conferencing:

• iotum’s service is initially only available for participants located in North America (and is ultimately limited at the moment by access to the SMS messaging and use of callerID) whereas Skype Conference calling can be worldwide
• IM+ for Skype offers the ability to conference, from a mobile platform, worldwide (for up to five participants) via Skype but call costs will also depend on wireless access and roaming charges.
• Mobivox, with local access points-of-presence in 29 countries, provides a conferencing capability for up to 10 participants, including Skype contacts, from a mobile device.
• iotum’s Free Conference Call does provide the ability to define an agenda.
• Skype Conference calls can be accompanied by chat and desktop sharing sessions.
• Skype Conference calls are limited to ten participants whereas iotum’s service can handle three figure numbers although there is no interface for a "host" to manage the call (muting participants, hand raising, adding/removing participants, etc.)
• Both can include in their calls participants who are not members of the respective underlying services.
• Skype is inherently more suitable to launch ad hoc (spontaneous) conference calls; personally I find it much faster and easier to set up a Skype Conference call.
• Skype with its wide audio bandwidth will provide much better voice quality than inherently audio-bandwidth-limited mobile phones. This was born out in a couple of calls this afternoon; one via Skype with all parties using Skype, the other via Free Conference Call where two of the three parties were on a mobile device. But the latter was quite acceptable for normal conversation.
• The costs for each service are going to largely depend on your relevant wireless or landline network access charges to any infrastructure conference bridge.. For instance, from Canada, most mobile calling plans do not include long distance calls to the U.S and can result in charges of up to $0.30 per minute.

However, the bottom line is that iotum’s Free Conference Call will handle calls primarily amongst networks of Facebook friends while Skype Conference Calls will largely be amongst networks of Skype Contacts. For you as an individual, these two social networks will only have the overlap that you, as the person responsible for your network of personal friends and business contacts, permit. In the end it’s not only about both these social networks and but also about which overall environment you choose to use for each particular purpose.

I think a big issue with all conference call services is to get the consumer public familiar with the basic concept of low cost, multi-party conference calls. Six years ago I was paying $200 for a one hour four party conference call (often involving a conference operator).. Earlier today I set up a five party Skype conference call in about ten seconds; we conferenced for 27 minutes at no cost to any party. But the consumer is still, at best, most familiar with three party calling as a legacy PSTN service and needs a mindset "reset" when it comes to conference calling.

And to reduce those wireless or landline access charges when using Free Conference Call:

• from any Skype client call the Free Conference Call bridge number via your SkypeOut service; you are then asked to enter your mobile number and are subsequently added to the conference call (an optional PIN number requirement is on the list of futures.). This has the potential to add a security issue but only if you know the scheduled time of the call and are somehow able to access information about "private" Free Conference Calls.

Let the mobile telephony plays continue!

Update: Garrett Smith (of Smith on VoIP fame), at his new Facebook Observer blog feels that iotum’s Free Conference Call "sets the bar for business Facebook applications".

PhoneBoy comments at Voice over IP weblog. (Yes, we were both, along with Dan and Phil, on the initial test calls.)

Tags: iotum, Facebook, Free Conference Call, TalkNow, Blackberry, Skype, Mobivox, IM+ for Skype, SkypeOut, Dan York, Disruptive Telephony, Garrett Smith, Facebook Observer

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In a previous post I presented several of the “PC Free” Skype dual mode cordless phones that were announced and/or exhibited at CES 2007. In this post I will cover other Skype appliance hardware that I encountered as I walked the show floor. (Note: click on the slide show to get the complete slide show in a larger format.)

At one presentation I was able to hear about the TrendNet ClearSky VoIP Conference Phone Kit. With its Bluetooth connection, this speaker phone can be freely moved about the office within a range of 100 meter (328 feet). More to follow once I have received an evaluation unit.

A new category introduced at the press conference was the Desktop Internet Phone – again a “PC Free” phone. Belgian vendor Topcom’s Webt@alker 5000 features a crisp LCD display accessing many Skype features via a menu and a large button touch keypad. Their forthcoming Topcom Wirless Expansion Kit will allow this “PC Free” phone to be connected to your local network via WiFi. The Webt@lker 5000 will provide an interesting user interface that I look forward to investigating further in a few weeks. Phil has reported more details here. From a market perspective I see the Desktop Internet phones more as a business phone while the Dual Mode Cordless phones will serve as residential phones linking friends and family.

A rather interesting concept was the QOOL Labs SkyQube GSM Voice Adapter. This was first reported in Skype Journal last spring but appeared to be operational at CES. The primary benefit we see for this is mobile phone roaming charge arbitrage using a combination of SkypeOut and SMS messaging.

Monday morning we heard about Skype’s being embedded in the future on the new Nokia N800 Internet Tablet. Another Tablet vendor who had embedded Skype (not yet certified) was the Pepper Pad 3 Handheld Web Computer. One interesting aspect about these non-Windows Internet Tablets is “:who is the target market demographic” given all the mobile smartphones and other Windows Mobile platforms; I could not get any answer beyond “maybe the geek community”.

My last visit of the show late Thursday afternoon was to the Gennum booth where they were displaying the Skype Certified nXZEN 5000 VoIP heaset (which I had been using with my Blackberry during the show). My next step is to install their Dongle Manager software and dongle itself to check out its Skype functionality. Certainly on my Blackberry it provided excellent voice quality provided you don’t lose the rubber grommet that assists in the isolation of your ear canal from surrounding sound. But they gave me a lifetime supply of grommets.

Finally one product that was not certified. Certainly an interesting concept but also demonstrates the need for Skype to protect the intellectual property associated with their brand. The Y5 World Hand Device (yes, that is the name on the brochure) incorporates not only Skype but also an embedded Windows Media Player and IE7 without a full Windows Mobile implementation. From the stickers attached to their demonstration unit display panels (shown in the photo), you can see an attempt to trade on the Skype name. This will be an interesting case more for the intellectual property issues than any feature issues.

Note to Qool Labs and Y5 World — forget the fancy Flash Player content that has to download to even access your website. Shows you do not understand marketing and the website 10 second rule … if I can’t get it in 10 to 15 seconds, I’m out of there, man!

Tags: Skype, CES2007, TrendNet, Topcom, Webt@alker 5000, Pepper Pad, nXZEN 5000

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Bill Gates keynote this evening of course introduced Windows Vista; however, it is not simply an operating system “upgrade” but rather a transformational product that brings media management and storage to the consumer audience. You can find more details in the multiple posts that will flow out; however, at the Bloghaus we were able to not only see but work with the forthcoming HP TouchSmart PC — representative of the many new types of hardware platforms that will be introduced with the Windows Vista launch. Two pictures: a side view ….

….and your morning weather report.

Features include:

• touch screen
• full support of TV, music, radio, photography, video and other home entertainment media
• Sports Lounge to manage your professional sports fan activities
• XBox controller support to fly around 3D images in Windows Live Local.

They seem to have left out any voice communications hardware, leaving an opening for Skype phones and related add-ons. One thing is certain: devices such as this will accelerate, but converge, the trend mentioned in this evening’s keynote where the younger demographic spends more time on the Internet than watching conventional TV.

Tags: Windows Vista, Bill Gates, HP Touchsmart

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Since its introduction at the final Fall Comdex in 2003, I have been following the SightSpeed video communications service as it has evolved into one of the more highly respected personal video calling services. Today they are releasing a new version 5.0; last week I spent an hour talking with Peter Csathey, CEO of SightSpeed, about SightSpeed, its direction and their forthcoming new version.

Peter, who has been CEO since last December, has SightSpeed focused on offering “best-in-class” personal video services. These services are envisioned to come in the form of

• Communications: private, secure video and voice calling communications;
• Community/Content with the introduction of a public directory, video blogging and other user generated content and SightSpeedTV
• Commerce: video-enabled e-commerce, video mail marketing; “click-to-call” video sales and support.

Previous versions of SightSpeed, a cross-platform service running on both Macs and Windows PC’s, have included video calling (with up to four in a conference), video mail messaging, video blogging support, chat and, recently, a beta outbound PSTN service. SightSpeed operates using direct (node-free) peer-to-peer connectivity for 1:1 video and audio calls. Multi-party video conferencing with its additional processing demands passes through a server.

SightSpeed 5.0 fleshes out what Peter calls “a complete personal video services suite”, offering several new capabilities;

• New video codec for sharper, crisper video in both 1:1 calls and n:1 (where N<=4) video conferences
• Over 90% dual firewall negotiation (no relays)
• A free PC to PC voice-only calling service (independent from the video service)
• Enhanced Mac support and adoption; their goal is to make the Mac experience be on par with the PC experience.
• Extends video blogging to two minute recording time.
• The outbound PSTN service will come out of beta; they will be adding inbound PSTN calling with DID numbers.
• Usability improvements
• My SightSpeed “click-to-call” buttons launching SightSpeed directly from a website.
• First beta release of SightSpeedTV; allowing viewing of analog TV channels, sourced from a Windows Media PC or TV tuner/video capture card.

One interesting feature of SightSpeed is its ability to adjust to “local user” network conditions. Normally video requires about 384 kbps bandwidth for a clear picture; however, if it determines the local user’s situation has degraded it automatically switches to a protocol that works down to 128 kbps. The picture quality degrades slightly in this situation but a viable video and voice conversation can continue; the user does get notification of the change.

SightSpeedTV in its current state is limited to handling live, analog channels; it includes a simple remote control for stepping up and down channels. It is anticipated that it will support digital TV and PVR devices in future releases associated with the release of Windows Vista.

Our discussion then turned to marketing and building a user base. SightSpeed is relying on viral marketing and market partner agreements to build awareness leading to direct sales. In order to encourage experience with their services, the Basic Plan which includes unlimited two party video and voice calling and unlimited 30 second video mail messages is free.

Winning several awards has facilitated the viral aspect; channel partners include hardware vendors (Creative Labs webcams), software vendors (Sonic Roxio) and cable partners such as Telewest and the U.K.’s Virgin Mobile. And, of course, the viral Mac community makes sure that awareness of SightSpeed is generated amongst Mac owners.

I asked Peter if he had any concern about regulatory issues. SightSpeed is tracking the regulatory environment closely; at the moment they are doing the same as Skype in stating they are “not a telephony replacement service and cannot be used to dial 911 or other emergency phone numbers”.

While Skype has had a lot of “regulatory visibility” since it is primarily a voice communications service, it is interesting to note that, since SightSpeed’s primary focus is on video, their entry into Internet voice calling has gone “below the radar” with respect to regulatory issues. SightSpeed’s use of VoIP-based services as an additional feature for its primary service is an ideal example of voice communication serving as an accessory application to another service and not a “phone system replacement”.

I closed out my interview by asking Peter about future developments for SightSpeed. Beyond the evolution of SightSpeedTV to support PVR’s and digital cable boxes, the most demanded feature is a session recording capability. And some day they hope to offer a SightSpeed client running on mobile devices such as Windows Mobile and Blackberries.

How good is SightSpeed’s video? Here’s a new (somewhat subjective) test for video quality. Yesterday, to check out Mac performance, I had my daughter install SightSpeed on her MacBook Pro (in a remote city); towards the end of our session she asked to see our dog. While positioning the dog so he could be seen by my webcam, the dog saw her on my laptop screen and tore off into the next room (behind the screen) where my wife reported that he was somewhat agitated and looking around the room for several minutes. Best we can figure out is that he was looking for our daughter, having seen her on the screen. (He does generate a lot of noise whenever he sees animals on our regular TV.)

From a more practical viewpoint, the video quality coming from the MacBook again was crisp with well defined images. My other test is to try it out full screen on my 1650 x 1080 screen; again while not quite as crisp it was certainly viewable without any problems.

Since its launch three years ago SightSpeed has set the bar for video-over-the-net performance; until the actual 5.0 release this evening we cannot do a full comparison with Skype’s video on Windows platforms. Being cross-platform, it has attracted a significant base of Mac users; Skype just yesterday released a “preview” (“it’s definitely not at beta stage yet”?) release of Skype for Mac that incorporates video.

The launch of SightSpeedTV introduces a new element into the place-shifting game. SlingBox uses a dedicated hardware platform that sits between the TV and cable box and/or PVR to bring personalized cable video to the Internet. SightSpeedTV relies on Windows applications to act as the source from a multi-tasking Windows Media Center PC or TV-tuner equipped Windows platform. In its current configuration SlingBox works with digital cable boxes and PVR’s providing access to a wider range of programming (in my case NHL Center Ice and MLB Extra Innings, for instance); also SlingBox allows the remote setting of PVR recording setups. Finally SlingBox provides a full emulation of my specific model of Scientific Atlanta remote control. SightSpeedTV is a “nice-to-have” accessory if you have the appropriate hardware but SightSpeed primarily excels with personal video services and user generated content.

Jeff Pulver refers to 2006 as the Year of Video on the Net; he’s even added a second VON show, Video on the Net, to be held at the same time as the Fall VON show in Boston. Skype and SightSpeed will be two of the major players in the personal video communications services space; we are entering interesting times as we watch the evolution of this space. In the meantime, let the SightSpeed Guy have his say.