VoIPabyte

Caller ID for International Termination

2008-07-21T18:18:00.000-07:00

One of the problems with buying international VoIP termination is that its almost impossible to control what the called party will see as the caller ID. This is because there are many intervening carriers involved in most international calls, and each carrier may have reasons for obscuring or re-writing the ANI of the original caller. However, there are a few carriers that are able to gurantee ANI delivery on certain international routes. They can do this because they have special relationships with the last-mile carrier in the target country. However, it can be very confusing to decipher which carriers are able to support ANI delivery, especiually since the situation may change from time to time.

grnVoIP has a solution. We have gone to the trouble of identifying those carriers with the capability to deliverr ANI to specific destinations. And, we have used this information to create a single Premium route that will provide ANI delivery to more than 100 international destinations. We expect to go live with this service soon. See the grnVoIP website for more details.

Network Neutrality as an Antitrust Issue?

2008-05-16T21:19:00.000-07:00

Network Neutrality as an Antitrust Issue?

VoIP-News.com wrote an article on May 13^{th 08} written by Robert Poe concerning network neutrality. In summary, John Conveyers has introduced a bill to Congress recently that would make network neutrality (the right for anyone to freely use the internet) to be an antitrust issue. If the internet is regulated and a company violates the new laws, then hefty fines through litigation would be imposed. An earlier bill proposed by Edward Markey would make network neutrality violations an FCC issue with common carrier rules that aren’t as hard to deal with as antitrust laws. Pushing this litigation will be hard for the congressmen because of the intensity of their campaigns. However, Comcast has given network neutrality media attention by blocking peer to peer downloading site Bit Torrent. Comcast eventually backed out of the situation. To read the entire article visit VoIP-News.com

Microsoft SP1 Service Pack For Small Business

2008-04-09T10:32:00.000-07:00

Microsoft's SP1 Service Pack is aimed at small business IP- VOIP networks. The new service pack will have a setup wizard allowing for small businesses to hook up VoIP in minutes as opposed to days or weeks. SP1 also will enable businesses to obtain local VoIP numbers, which is great for yellow page listings and other directories. Microsoft will be looking to team up with IP-Vendors as they edge their way into the IP-VoIP small business market. They’ll be looking to control this market as they do with other software programs. A billion dollar monopoly lawsuit is nothing for them compared to the benefits of having 80-90 percent market share with their operating systems. Watch out for Microsoft in the IP-VoIP industry to try the same strategy. They may not even need the best solution; just the compatibility of programs alone will make them a big threat.

Response Point will give small businesses more control to set up features like adds, moves, and more. It uses voice activated recognition software for simplicity. It’ll be easy to access entire company directories form phones. Microsoft is coming out with a DVX 2000 version, Uniden Evolo, Quanta Syspine, and D-Link Version.

Some more criticism: Response point doesn’t support T1 Trunking which is very important. It doesn’t support Plain old telephone networks (POTS), and has problems with remote access.

Only the future will tell how Response Point pans out.

Solegy's Chatvertizer Receives Product of the Year Award from United Communications Magazine

2008-03-18T14:40:00.000-07:00

Here at GRNVoIP we use Solegy to provide all of our back-office services. They announced an award from Unified Communications today. Here is the press release form their website.

Solegy Receives Product of the Year Award from Unified Communications Magazine

New York, NY. (March 18, 2008) — Solegy is proud to announce that its Chatvertizer application has received the Product of the Year Award from Unified Communications magazine for representing a ground-breaking advancement in the field of UC technologies for the year 2007.

The Solegy Chatvertizer is an automated system that allows advertisers to engage customers in a chat environment by presenting opt-in advertisements based on highly selectable criteria. In its simplest form, it will will dispatch a chatbot to join target chat rooms using the XMPP instant messaging protocol and listen for keywords. When a keyword is encountered and matches defined conditions, it will send a message to the originator that can contain an HTML link to a Web location.

For example, a chatbot might be configured to be listed for the keywords "drive", "car" and "wheels". When these keywords appear in the proper order and context, the chatbot can send a message to the originator (or to the entire chat room) suggesting a product or location of potential interest, such as a car manufacturer's Website, or an online auction for autos.

With the ever increasing popularity of non-traditional video distribution methods, such as You Tube, time-shifting and video-on-demand, advertisers are finding it difficult to find appropriate venues of engagement to reach their intended audience. The Solegy Chatvertizer system offers an ideal complement to existing advertising fora by providing an additional opportunity for advertisers to identify and interact with their target audience. For instance, video content can contain pointers to online chat rooms where interested participants can engage with others interested parties. These chat rooms, hosted by the content owner, may then serve as a fertile environment in which to serve highly targeted advertising messages.

Key to the system is Solegy's powerful ServicePDQ back end. With it, content owners can provide advertisers with a means to specify the keywords and conditions that they wish to act upon. In an competitive environment, advertisers can even bid on keywords in real-time, such that only the highest bidder gets the opportunity to offer its content. Each keyword impression is tracked by the Solegy ServicePDQ back-office so that informative metrics are made available in real-time, allowing advertisers to alter their strategy as the need may arise. The ServicePDQ system can also keep track of impression charges so that payment to the content owner can be settled in an efficient manner. The Solegy system also enforces policies regarding users that choose to opt-in and can be enhanced to allow keyword-response value pairs based on an individual's user-specific criteria.

For more information, please contact sales@solegy.com.

About Solegy

Solegy offers managed deployment and back-office systems for VoIP, wireless and cable networks. ServicePDQ, Solegy’s managed Service Delivery Platform (SDP), enables service providers to launch broadband communications services with minimal capital expenditure and integration overhead, resulting in reduced risk, faster time-to-market and a higher return on investment. These service solutions are developed for use with IP and IMS-based networks and applications. Solegy pre-built applications include SOHO Broadband Phone, Voice VPN, Wholesale Peering, Calling cards, as well as Web, SMS & Traditional and Callback. Built on the Solegy ServicePDQ platform, all Solegy solutions provide a real time, operator-grade session management and back-office environment. Solegy is based in New York City, with offices in San Jose, Toronto and Manila. For more information please visit www.solegy.com.

About Unified Communications magazine

New in July 2007, Unified Communications magazine is devoted to educating enterprise decision makers on why and how they need to deploy unified communications (UC) solutions. Every issue of Unified Communications magazine features a comprehensive news section; case studies of successful deployments and lessons learned; interviews with leading hardware and software companies; and an 'industry' section, featuring analysis of important mergers and acquisition, partnerships and a Wall Street perspective on the unified communications market. Unified Communications has a subscriber base of 41,509.

About TMC

Technology Marketing Corporation (TMC) is an integrated global media company helping our clients build communities in print, online and in-person. TMC publishes Customer Interaction Solutions, INTERNET TELEPHONY, Unified Communications, and IMS Magazine. TMCnet, TMC's Web site, is the leading source of news and articles for the communications and technology industries. According to Quantcast, TMCnet reaches nearly one million U.S. unique visitors each month. TMCnet serves as many as three million unique visitors globally each month according to Webtrends. TMC is also the first publisher to test new products in its own on-site laboratories, TMC Labs. In addition, TMC produces INTERNET TELEPHONY Conference & EXPO, and Call Center 2.0 Conference. (*alexa.com is an amazon.com company that ranks Web sites by their traffic levels. Neither alexa.com nor amazon.com is affiliated with TMCnet.)

For more information about TMC, visit www.tmcnet.com.

I think that companies can benefit greatly from an advertising program like this. Advertising is a necessity in competitive markets these days, and forward thinking advertising that is unobtrusive is a must have.

Ads that I'm not in favor of include pay per play advertising, which are audio ads that play every time you load a website. They sound annoying to me, and people are way to quick to blog positively about it. They get hyped up about the 100 percent conversion rates, whilst not seeing how irritating they are.

Something to look out for in my opinion is flash video ads that are silent, but can be listened to by clicking on the volume is the web visitor is interested.

Wireless VoIP: Moving Beyond Traditional VoIP Networks

2008-03-07T16:45:00.001-08:00

Wireless VoIP aka, WVoIP is an exciting area in the VoIP arena. It can be used over Wifi,EVDO Revision-A, HSDPA, and WiMAX. Callers aren’t limited to a single phone, and can use a headset, laptop, PDA, or a mobile-WiFi phone.

Wireless VoIP has a limited range despite its immense cost savings to mobile users. Also, It doesn’t always work well with WiFi networks originally engineered for data as opposed to voice packets. This gives current cell phone networks the advantage over wireless VoIP despite cost savings.

Tata Communications said that they are coming out with the largest WiMaX network to date. Telsima will build the network. Its supposed to cover over 110 cities with limited coverage and 15 with full coverage. Many of the areas covered don’t have access to broadband, and only about 3 million people in India have access to broadband networks out of a total population of 1.2 billion.

Three of the U.S WiMAX network providers include: MetroBridge Networks, which covers Arizona and Seatle, Clearwire which holds 2.5 GHZ licenses with a test market in the Northwest, (They plan to compete with other WiMAX providers nationwide), and Sprint-Nextel who also has 2.5 GHZ licenses, and they plan to cover Washington D.C , Baltimore, and Chicago.

With all of the competition WiMAX commands, the technology can only get better, and this is an exciting time for mobile phone users who want cheaper rates using wireless VoIP, especially for long distance calls only costing pennies.

Here at GRNVoIP we have a new customer portal!

2008-02-22T08:39:00.000-08:00

Here at GRNVoIP we have a new customer portal! It's more user friendly, flexible, and provides more features. GRNVoIP is always striving to go beyond the regualr user experience, and to provide the best customer service in the wholesale VoIP market.

I'm going to point you to this article about proxy servers today. I don't really use them, but If you need to protect your ID and equipment, looks like they can come in handy. After all, you don't want Angelina Jolie snoopping around in your computer (Sorry, I watched the movie Hackers again recently lol, great movie)

What Do You Get From a Proxy Server?

What do you think of when you hear the words proxy server? If you're like me, the first thing it makes you think of is something like "Night at the Roxbury". It is just the "x" that gets me I guess. Kind of silly isn't it? However, the truth is that it is nothing like that. How much do you know about proxy servers? Here we will briefly go over what exactly a proxy server is and some of the benefits you will enjoy while using one.

A proxy server actually does a few things you may not be aware of. It lets you surf the web without anyone knowing it was you! Does that sound absurd? It isn't. There are many reasons and occasions when people do not want to be detected while viewing certain websites.

Some of these instances to use a proxy server would be if you are at school. It's likely that the computers at your school prohibit you from accessing certain websites, or certain types of websites. Your internet surfing behavior is often monitored. Maybe you have tried to visit something during a break only to find you were unable to. This is probably because it was blocked.

The same is true of many workplaces today. You will be unable to visit websites that they have already blocked on their computers.

However, by using proxy servers you will normally be able to unblock and access these pages. Many people use proxy servers to be able to surf the internet, and websites of their choice anonymously.

Anonymous surfing is not the only use for proxy servers though. They can also increase the speed and effectiveness of your internet connection in some cases. Whenever it is used on a network of computers, it will automatically save information, files, and web pages that are commonly accessed. This saves time from retrieving the information individually each time someone new tries to access it.

This is called a "cache." When someone requests a web page for example, by trying to view it, the proxy server will check the cache first to see if it is there. If it is, the information will be provided quicker than if it isn't.

Lastly, proxy servers are an effective tool in hiding your IP address. When you go on the internet and visit a website, you can be leaving behind traces of your identity like you IP address. Hackers can get this information and even gain access to your personal computer and hard drive. Therefore, it can be very important to hide information like this from others.

Overall, by using a proxy server you can help ensure that you are safe. There are many places that enable you to use a proxy server via their websites. By doing this you will be keeping your information private, safe, and out of dangerous hands. You are also able to surf to websites of your choice anonymously, even if they are normally "blocked" on the computer that you are using.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Veronica_A_Davis

Article Source: EzineArticles.com

Thinnovation Apple's Macbook Air bliss for the VoIP lover’s soul

2008-01-30T09:51:00.000-08:00

Apple's Macbook air is strategically designed and innovative to say the least. It’s oober thin and doesn’t forgo all of the other features that Mac lover’s love, like that enormous mouse pad that dosen’t make you strain to get from point A to point B on your laptop, a built in webcam, and long battery life. Weighing in with 2GB of ram, a 1.6 ghz or 1.8ghz processor with the famed quad core duo processor, what more could you ask for?

Of course it will come at a hefty price tag at $1,800 or $3,000 for the 1.6 and the 1.8 ghz preorders respectively, they will still fly off the shelves. I personally won’t be able to join in on the action, but hmmm maybe I can... nahh you can’t sell organs on Ebay anymore. Maybe I’ll be able to get one once they have some refurbs up on their site. Apple is known for having refurbs that work really well, and all of their refurbs come with the Leopord upgrade. Cootos to Steve Jobs and Apple for continuing to innovate while most other computer manufacturer is sleeping. It’ll be coming with the Mac OSX Leopord upgrade of course, and users will see that purple space desktop wallpaper as they power up their Macbook Air’s. Why not make a VoIP call while your at it after your all set up. That’s all I need, a Macbook with VoIP and Adobe Photoshop, caramel macchiato, and a newspaper and I’m all set.

Where can apple go next? Maybe they will imbed Macbooks into our skin. Who knows. What I do know is that Apple is staying on the cutting edge of technology and they deserve what they are getting. Apple’s computer market share,(thanks in part to the Apple IPod) has risen from two percent to over eight percent and climbing reminiscing the days of IBM’s big blue vs. Apple and that super bowl ad with the big brother 1984 theme. Apple purports the American ideal of freedom, individuality, and creativity.

The Future Of VoIP What Lies Ahead In 2008?

2008-01-17T14:09:00.000-08:00

Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) has changed the way people communicate, and most people who have heard about it or used it would agree. VoIP has allowed for sending voice packets over the internet rather than communicating through Public Switched Telephone Networks (PSTN). With all of its success and move to broadband, shift to switches, better sound quality, and connections, where does VoIP have left to go?

1.To begin with, look for VoIP to rapidly evolve in the mobile industry as it has already done so with land-line phones. Third Generation (3G) users are expected to reach over 230 million by the end of the year 2012. Look for interesting new headsets to also cause buzz such as Apple’s 3G headset coming out.

2. Watch for VoIP to keep up its integration into web 2.0 interfaces such as Ebay (actually may be selling Skype), Facebook, and Myspace. VoIP will be continuing to look for new ways to improve similar websites whether they are auction sites, social networking sites, or blogs. The ability to block unwanted calls and privacy is another factor that can lead to success for the integration of VoIP. People need to feel that they are in control and don’t want disruptive calls.

       3. The integration of VoIP into places that are more
convenient for people to

access it, such as in web browsers is another innovation to look for. Plugins, or

a ad-on to browsers that allow for enhanced content,

can enable people to connect to their VoIP phone where they most often use

their computers for online activities. Macromedia has announced that a flash

plugin will include a session initiation protocol client (SIP client), so that it will

be even easier for websites to create SIP applications.

www.tringme.com

is the

first such implementation.  Here's a video about it
http://www.vcasmo.com/video/flash/1046.

Most of the newer Nokia phones

(the E and N series such as E51) have

built in SIP clients and Wifi built-in. 

This means that anyone who
buys

one of these phones can use VoIP alongside

their cellular service

when

they are in a hotspot.

People like web interface interaction to be convenient and useful and VoIP

plugins are the way to go.

4. Mobile applications will make VoIP stand out in 2008 such as with Google’s Android, which will have an open source mobile platform and the application Bonanza that Google

is going to market. Google has encouraged developers to create applications for its operating system, and some betas have been created already.

5. Look for VoIP in gaming as gamers continue to move online and interact with each other. Skype announced that it partnered with Sony on its PSP systems to enable VoIP calling with SkypeIn and SkypeOut.

With all of these new trends, applications, and developments to look out for, VoIP hasn’t slowed down as some would say. It’s still continuing to evolve and save businesses, call centers, and consumer’s money while continuing to improve quality and features.

Wikipedia a VoIP info lover's friend

2008-01-02T12:04:00.000-08:00

I’m addicted to Wikipedia. If Wikipedia could talk and move, I think I would reserve it a seat at every dinner outing. I’m not the only one addicted to Wikipedia. Hundreds upon thousands of people use it as a reference for there info needs, especially tech/VoIP folks. There are countless spin-offs of Wikipedia to go along. Developers are often putting the Wiki's into their sites or forums. Why do I and others love Wikipedia so much? I think it’s because of the excessive hyper-search results on the internet. If you search for something like VoIP in Google for instance, you get a bunch of companies, weblogs, news, sponsored links, government links, directories, and of course a link to wikipedia. Wheww that’s a lot of different kinds of content. Wikipedia tends to cut the confusion and get right to the info. It’s highly monitored, and has no spam tolerance. Try editing a page and you’ll know what I’m talking about. If you don’t author an article that’s exactly the way Wikipedia wants it, then it’ll be marked in the code, and subsequently deleted soon after if you don’t argue your case (often they delete your article even if you do plead your case).

The best thing you can do in Wikipedia is follow there guidelines carefully. Entries can’t be written like an advertisement (i.e pushing/promoting a company, not mentioning competitors). However, Companies do show up on Wikipedia. Getting a company into Wikipedia is an art form in itself. Use a lot of reference and citations if you have any. This will increase your chances of success because Wikipedia entries are supposed to be written in an encyclopedic manner. Pay attention to your Wiki talk tab/section. If a moderator doesn’t like what you’ve written, they will talk to you in this section. Often you have to put a{{hang on}} tag in the code in order to talk to the moderator before an entry is deleted. Putting too many external links up on Wikipedia is considered spamming. Figuring out how to write good articles on Wikipedia is worth it, and will show up in top search engine results.

VoIP-CRM Systems The customer is always right.

2007-12-12T08:57:00.000-08:00

VoIP-News has an article written by Cindy Waxer today about how CRM can be improved by VoIP’s low cost of implementation, increased productivity, and efficiency.

Cisco Systems INC. decided to join forces with Microsoft, using their Cisco Unified CRM Connector with Microsoft's Dynamics CRM 3.0 software. A Cisco IP phone now can be used with Microsoft’s CRM system, creating a three dimensional customer relationship management atmosphere. Other companies are also getting in on the action such as Contactual INC.

Leading to the CRM VoIP integration is VoIP’s ability to easily be remotely hosted and managed. The cost for a business to put together a CRM–VoIP solution is around $ 50,000- making it highly plausible for small businesses with small IT staffs.

Businesses are creating scalability using automated preview dialing with list management, call distribution, status reporting & calling scripts. Inbound screen pop-ups id incoming calls and customer info. Users can dial straight from records with Click-to-dial, and record activity. " They posses a cool quotient," according to Paul Greenberg, author of CRM at the Speed of Light.

However, VoIP Quality is a concern for businesses. Dropped calls, poor quality, and downtime can occur. Overall though, VoIP can add to the CRM experience.

I think that VoIP can greatly augment a CRM system. CRM is extremely important these days in a sea of services. Consumers have a hyper-choice of vendors to pick from, and a well organized and run CRM system can be all the difference. First impressions are especially critical with new customers. Companies only get to make one, and it’s usually always the most important. Fast response time and an aura of care will differentiate a company from competitors.

Average Call Duration (ACD) & Average Service Ratio (ASR) are always a concern. It's important to maintain the right relationships with VoIP providers to get the best VoIP quality as we do here.

Michigan VoIP the Mystery of VoIP Suppliers Keyword Searches

2007-11-28T10:17:00.001-08:00

I’ve often been perplexed as to the reason why Michigan VoIP is so highly ranked (13 on my Wordtracker {KEI analysis= most searched/least competitive Search Engine Optimization} (SEO) keywords. Recently, I stumbled upon Tom Keating’s Michigan VoIP blog entry from his VoIP & Gadgets Blog. Tom used Overture for his research and came up with similar results, finding Michigan VoIP as number 20 on his VoIP related keywords lists. It even beat out VoIP traffic and Asterisk VoIP # 21 and 22 respectively, according to Tom. Maybe people want a local VoIP provider? But why isn’t any other local VoIP term found on our VoIP Service Keyword lists? Keating says that there are countless foreign immigrants who live in Michigan who may want to call home utilizing the cost benefits of VoIP suppliers. There are more than 160,000 Hispanics in Michigan according to Tom’s research of a 1990 census. Also more than 150,000 of Greek decent and more than 100,000 of Arab decent. The question is, why aren’t mosaic melting pot cites like New York City or Los Angeles showing up under VoIP suppliers then?

I couldn’t dig up anything but an interesting reply to Tom’s blog by username Alex brought in some new insights

Someone asked in a blog why anyone would Google for "Michigan voip", so every blog visitor started Googling for "michigan voip" to see what comes up.

This could definitely lead to Michigan VoIP being indexed more. That is people are finding out about people writing about the Michigan VoIP phenomenon and then Googling more. I don’t think that this would entirely solve the problem however, and this defiantly doesn’t reach the initial source, but may be combined with other theories.

Because of the nice "Michigan Telephone, VoIP and Broadband" website, It works like this: "You know... there is this nice site about VoIP... don't remember the address... but it had to do with VoIP and there was something about Michigan..."

This could be a cause for the Michigan VoIP occurrence with VoIP Solution Keywords, but it would take a lottttt of resources like this to make Michigan VoIP such a popular search term.

Because of the E911 lawsuit in Michigan against Vonage and/or the E911 surcharge VoIP users have to pay in Michigan.

This could be helping Michigan VoIP, but a lot of the searches that I did for Michigan VoIP E911 lawsuit found the case, but didn’t have Michigan VoIP in that precise syntax sequence. Michigan and VoIP were often spread out throughout the text.

So the mystery still remains about Michigan VoIP. Any ideas?

VoIP Globalization

2007-11-14T08:42:00.000-08:00

Intele-Card News (subscription required) has an interesting article written by J. Scott Hamilton about the Globalization of VoIP. It says that the large amount of emigrant communities are allowing prepaid VoIP to grow. VoIP is attractive in countries outside of the U.S. A call from the U.S to Mexico only saves the caller 5 cents compared with a Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN). On the other hand, a call from Mexico to the U.S would save the caller 48 cents. However, tapping into this market has its downside. There are technical issues that can occur and regulations that must be followed. The local VoIP market is saturated, but In-Call advertising, which is next generation advertising that is placed within calls without being garish (and is highly effective) looks to be a promising way to break through the clutter. VoodooVox is a company that offers such features. For more information visit Intele-Card News.

Here at GRNVoIP we’re often dealing with technical issues that need to be resolved. Our staff is always working hard to keep the termination running smoothly. VoIP regulation can be a disaster for business. Look at the hard times Bangladesh has gone through in establishing VoIP call centers/ Businesses.

It’s great to see companies like VoodooVox thinking up new ways to earn revenue through In-Call Advertising. Especially advertising that isn’t annoying and grabs people’s attention. Advertising revenues are growing every year and people are getting more and more creative about where to place advertising such as putting ads in computer network’s SSID’s. It’s definitely an exciting market to keep track of. For example, look at Google Adwords, earning Google billions of dollars and helping companies get the word out with Adsense. Advertising whether we like them or not is evolving at a swift pace and finding new ways to reach its target audience. In inundated markets and with tough international regulations, it can be a companies’ best bet for profit margins.

~ Dilbert~

Sun Microsystems "Back In Black"

2007-10-31T08:33:00.000-07:00

First off, Excuse me for diving right into this blog, I believe proper introductions are needed. This Blog is a compilation of GRNVoIP, staff thoughts about the VoIP industry and other events happening in related fields. You can call me the VoIPMan. I’m 22 years old, yes 22 and a VoIP Biz enthusiast. I come from a family of 7, and live in an apartment in NJ with my fiance Shannon. I commute to New York City via train. I like technology, the arts, (movies, music, films, writing, philosophy, books) history/world events, the environment , and to dabble in some other stuff here and there. I will be writing mostly about VoIP and related industries as described above, and will be throwing in as much of my personal insights as possible. Pardon me if I go off on tangents, I’m a big fan of abstraction.

So, Xchange Magazine, has an uplifting article about Sun Microsystems INC, written by Paula Bernier (subscription required) .The once giant in the Silicon Valley is making a comeback with their new CEO Jonathan Schwartz. He led a restructuring effort that cut headcount, consolidated real estate holdings, and lowered spending. Sun’s UltraSparc T2 chip (lowering power consumption), and Project Blackbox (mobile data center solution) will become available soon, and ready to boost profits. Sun’s Java technology is still holding strong and is synonymous with Sun in its Nasdaq stock ticker. Sun also maintains a close relationship with Google. Google is including Sun’s StarOffice suite, which is similar to Microsoft office but is open source like Solegy’s opensourcesip . Open Source applications are free to the public and can be developed by anyone. Which of course, is why they are so popular. You can read the full article in October’s Xchange Magazine.

I think that it’s great to see companies like Sun back in action. Innovative thinking is critical to surviving in a fast paced sector like technology. It’s important to keep up with news such as this (and exciting). In our business, we are always striving to emulate this model of cutting edge awareness.

Vonage Sued By Sunrocket's Asset Holding Company

2007-10-31T07:42:00.000-07:00

With the shutdown of SunRocket last month, other Voip companies started to offer packages aimed at SunRocket’s former customers. Now SunRocket’s asset holding company Sherwood Partners, is suing Vonage for allegedly using SunRocket’s customer list without consent. SunRocket said that its customer list is "one of its single most valuable remaining assets," and that Vonage's useage of the list has led to "immediate and irreparable harm and injury." Vonage thinks otherwise and said it got the list from a marketing company. If Vonage is guilty of using the list, the ruling will compromise other Voip companies’ agreements with Sunrocket as well.

I find it incredible that Sunrocket has "risen from the dead," so to speak, (well not really, because the plaintiff in this case is the asset holding company) to sue Vonage. They're doing so in order to hold on to what leverage they possibly can. This case should be used to remind business owners that even with the "death" of a company, the rules still apply. Vonage could be finding itself down a whole lot of money if they lose the case (amongst other lawsuits).

It's crucial for employees or bosses to think their actions through. In todays business world, we are often rushed into making brash decisions. I think that everyone can use a little "jimmney cricket" telling them to slow down, and that the wise tortoise often wins the race over the crass hair. I'm not saying that employees or bosses should move too slowly, but they need to be careful, especially when working for a company like Vonage that is in the public eye, and consequentially "ripe for the pickins," in "sue me" America.

In my writing, I often find myself scared to publish anything, for lack of better terms. Usually, I overcome this fear with a few edits and a walk around the office, or maybe some sleep (hard to come by) if i'm at home, or get some coffee. Many people for instance, including those who really should know, don't understand copyright laws. Even if something isn't marked as copy-written, if it's created by someone else, it technically has a copyright. You can't copy this work, or else you can be fined or prosecuted. If someone is looking for content to add for a project, or something such as a website, they should look into other methods such as: creating original material, syndication, copyleft, donated material, ask for permission, or material in the public domain ( most of the government's material is included). And of course anything written before the year 1924 can be copied. This includes images as well (for you designers out there).

Patents last for 20 years usually, and they give inventors a heads up in the market with their product, service, or unique process. Someone else can come along and add a new feature, but can’t copy the invention. If the patent is dishonored, the offender can be subject to a civil lawsuit.

Lesson learned, be careful when you make business decisions or else you'll end up like Vonage.