I ran across this video from 1982 where Jane Barbe and John Doyle-Mama and Papa time respectively-were interviewed. Why were they called that? Watch the video and see:



I miss the POPCORN service-something I frequently dialed as a child living in Northern California. Up until AT&T decided to discontinue the service in September 2007, I continued to use it to check the time when a computer wasn't handy.

Of course, if AT&T really wanted to, they could have easily replaced the service with equipment that didn't break down as much as the old Audichron machine did. An Asterisk server synched up with an NTP server could have easily provided the service-complete with Jane Barbe's voice!

Meanwhile, you can still hear Jane Barbe's voice on WWVN at +1 808 335 4363 or on a shortwave radio near you!

Back in November when Jajah and Jangl announced their partnership, I wondered aloud whether or not this might turn into something else. Turns out it did, but not exactly the way I was thinking it would.

Michael Cerda, the former CEO of Jangl, posted on his blog today that him, Ben Dean, and five others are going to Jajah. Meanwhile, a skeleton crew is left at Jangl to keep the services running and try and find a buyer.

Wonder how much of the Jangl magic will make it into Jajah, which is turning into quite the telephony platform.

Om Malik is reporting that the telcos are looking at creating a Skype-killer. From the article:

[Incumbent local exchange carriers] are going to offer a VoIP client that will work on the incumbent broadband/3G wireless pipe, and will use a backend platform that will allow folks to make free voice calls to anyone who's logged into it.

Hello, incumbent carriers? 2003 called and wants their idea back. Way too little, way too late. That and I don't believe they can do it any more than elephants can fly or monkeys can fly out of my butt.

My solution? Go back to your roots. Take this 1980 Bell System commercial:



While the details might seem quaint and the commercial date, the idea is still valid. Of course, instead of switching telephone circuits, they should be switching IP packets. As fast as possible. On the fattest pipes the world has ever seen. Keeping our communication system the best in the world, indeed.

Pat Phelan, the mastermind behind Cubic Telecom and MAXroam has launched a brand new service called Twitterfone. It uses speech recognition to turn your voice into tweets on your Twitter account.

A number of services also provide a similar service: Jott and Spinvox come to mind. However, Spinvox is a pay service and Jott is "free in beta." However, this is focused only on twitter, and it's bog simple to use.

Local country numbers are available in 10 different countries, including the US, UK, and Ireland. Local numbers in 40 countries are expected within the next 6 weeks.

Crossposted from The Web 2.0 Weblog

I've been spending a lot of time looking at old movies made for the Bell System. One that caught my eye was this a video that showed the various parts that went into making a telephone handset: all 448 parts!



They sure don't make phones like that anymore! Of course, back then you didn't own your telephone, you leased it from the Bell System. The phones were built for this leasing environment-built to last!

Belkin announced in January that they were releasing a Desktop Internet Phone for Skype. It has a color screen, supports "over 500" Skype contacts, and supports SkypeIn and SkypeOut. The phone also features speed dial, call hold/release, call pickup/park, mute, redial, hold, call-timer display, and contact list.

Personally, I don't see the point of a fixed telephone anymore. I don't even have room for such a beast on my desk. At least the WiFi Skype phones can be used anywhere you have WiFi.

While the original press release said March of 2008 for availability, the phone was not available for purchase at press time. It will have a suggested retail of $99.

Via Josh Spear