The Vine

FMC where are you?

I am currently sitting in my favorite coffeeshop/restaurant in DC (Busboys and Poets) where the food is good and the wifi exists and the couches are comfortable. The one problem with Busboys is that it is in a complete cell dead zone. I have no coverage at all while inside and even when I walk outside it takes a minute to get some spotty reception on the IPhone 3G.

So this begs the question, what ever happened to fixed-mobile convergence (FMC). I understand that a FMC solution for voice might be costly and not that good, but why isn’t there a solution for SMS. I am for all intents and purposes sending a short email to another phone. I wouldn’t mind if my phone called back to some server to update that I was not in cell coverage, but was on a wifi network and to route all SMS or maybe in the future voice calls to me over the Internet.

I understand the routing of this might not be easy seeing as I am on a private network, but Skype can do it, why not have some sort of application on the phone that helps facilitate this. I would even pay an extra 10 dollars a month for something like this if it had capability for carrying voice. They are definitely missing out on a big market and it is unfortunate, because FMC is a way forward especially with all of these plans for ubiquitous Internet with WiMAX and other 4G technologies coming down the pipe in the next few years.

Tips worth exploring if you’re a startup…

The majority of our readers visit TechCrunch on a daily basis, but we still felt like we should highlight a recent post covering ten simple guidelines you should review before pitching your startup to a wider audience.  ”How To Demo Your Startup” by Michael Arrington covers Jason Calacanis‘ observations after sitting through over 200 companies pitches.  If you’re looking to pitch your startup’s new site in the near future you should definitely dig into Jason’s ten tips.

Some of our favorite tips included:
4. Talk about what you’ve done, not what you’re going to do.
5. Understand your competitive landscape–current and historical.
3. Leave people wanting more.

Definitely worth your time if you’re looking to pitch your site in the near or distant future.

Make that two sir…

So to follow in line with my colleague canceling XM, I canceled my Sirius subscription last week. My reasons are numerous, but I just don’t listen to it as much as I once did to justify having the service. I have had the service since mid-2005 and am kind of sad to see it go, but wish that they would come up with some sort of capability for the IPhone.

Right now Sirius allows users to listen online through a web browser and it would not be that hard to enable the same feature for the IPhone browser or even make it an application. Pandora and Last.fm are doing a good job of piping the content over the 3G connection, why not follow suit. I can even imagine them partnering with Apple and developing a 30-pin connector satellite antenna that would enable satellite coverage.

I want one device, and I hope that this will be true one day.

Times are changing…

A few weeks ago we blogged AM/FM Radio, meet the iPhone App Store. Now play nice. and recently Justin at Oatmeal Stout blogged The Pandora iPhone App and the Death of the Radio, but today I took it a step further… I cancelled my XM Radio Account. Even with XM prepares native iPhone app for streaming radio catching my attention on my Google Reader I still don’t feel inclined to pay XM Radio an additional $100 a year for music.

Anyone else?

What office phone are you using?

Mike Gunderloy of Web Worker Daily asks which office phone are you using? Simple. Here at Sucklevine we use both Skype (@ sucklevine) and GrandCentral.

Our phone number is a number we selected through Google’s Beta GrandCentral service which acts as our main line. However, both options have the ability to be configured to forward to an additional device when we’re on the road. Its simple, its cheap, and it does the job we need.

The SMS Killer - Facebook/AIM…

In an effort to coordinate activities today a friend and I were texting back and forth on our IPhones, but we weren’t using traditional SMS, we were using facebook private messages. Why Not? We both had the facebook app and it took no longer to type out a message in facebook (with an unlimited length by the way) than it would in the normal SMS place on the IPhone.

You could do the same thing with AIM if you wanted to text people without IPhones. Hopefully the ease of alternative messaging on converged devices will convince carriers to stop charging outrageous prices for SMS. Right now I am one of the suckers that paid $15/month for 1500 messages. I am going to be reducing that in my next go around as more and more of my contacts get converged devices, I have no need to pay AT&T anymore than I do.

Goodbye Randy Pausch

Some of you may know that Randy Pausch died yesterday of complications relating to pancreatic cancer. Randy was a professor at Carnegie Mellon and became an Internet and real world sensation when his famed “last lecture” was posted on youtube. The lecture focused on achieving your childhood dreams and was an incredible watch. I also bought the book that came after the lecture. The book paralleled the lecture with some additional material.

Randy was responsible for a lot of work in the virtual reality and virtual worlds realm. He started a class at Carnegie Mellon that was project oriented and put students in groups for them to build their own virtual worlds. Randy is also responsible for the ALICE project which helps children learn to program in innovative ways using what Randy calls a “head fake” - something where you dont explicitly tell people what they are doing.

It is unfortunate that with the technology that exists today such awful diseases exist such as pancreatic cancer. I was only aware of Randy because of his last lecture, but am glad that I was able to follow his life over the past 9 months. He will surely be missed, but his contributions to Carnegie Mellon and the world of technology and programming will continue to live on.

Thank you IPhone

So I have now had my IPhone for 2 weeks and I seem to like it more and more each day. It now actually sleeps in bed next to me (the charger is plugged in behind my bed and doesn’t reach the table). I never thought I wouldn’t like the phone, but I did not expect it to be this useful.

No matter where I am, I now have some use for my IPhone and the mere fact that it is a phone and Ipod and has last.fm means that I have cut my car gadgets down from 4 to 2 (satellite radio is gone and the phone and Ipod are now one). Once they release turn by turn directions for it, I can get rid of my GPS and be significantly lighter than I was before.

Riding on the metro I can listen to music or play monkey ball. While walking to and from class or in the grocery store I can now answer email if I feel as though I need to or even chat through facebook or AIM. This means that when I am at home I do not need to rush to my computer and answer the emails I may have missed while I was gone. I know this sounds like I am addicted email, but it just makes my life easier that I now have constant connectivity IF I need it.

The whole aspect of having last.fm and pandora over the 3G network is awesome. The quality of the songs that are coming through are not that great, maybe a little less than radio quality, but it the mere fact that I can do it is what I like. I have only begun to explore the other applications and I cannot wait for more and more people to develop for it. Just give me turn by turn directions and I will be happy, and then people will have little reason to not buy an IPhone, especially around upgrade time. A GPS, IPod, phone and satellite radio like replacement for less than $300, that is a steal.

Yes, I do have a new confession to make. I am now officially an Apple fan boy.

AM/FM Radio, meet the iPhone App Store. Now play nice.

Are you one of the many starting to believe that radio will continue its slow painful death at a faster rate now thanks to the launch of the Apple iPhone application store? Recently Jimmy of EastCoastBlogging.com briefly mentioned his experience to me at the Twin Tech Party in DC and I couldn’t have agreed with him more.

With the launch of the Apple iPhone Application Store the iPhone platform offers its users the ability to download and run Pandora, Last.fm, and/or AOL Radio applications.. so why tune in? Of course if you’re looking for local AM/FM radio stations for talk radio you probably still tune in. NPR has made the switch to Podcasting, they are one of the many adapting, what about everyone else? Web streaming your local radio broadcast just won’t cut it anymore. And your local advertisers? I won’t even get into it.

There are several views of the future of radio and I am no radio expert so don’t expect me to make the argument that radio is dead (Video killed the radio star?). Yet, I have to say, with an unlimited data plan from my provider and applications like this at my finger tip (literally) I’m starting to look past even listening to my AM/FM radio.

Can you imagine what device sales of XM or SIRIUS will look like after they release (if they release) an iPhone application? They are more than likely going to charge you for the purchase of your iPhone application, but still you’ve removed the need to buy this.

To quote Jerry Del Colliano of INSIDE MUSIC MEDIA, “radio has little future as of this moment.”