Broadband Surf Report: Vonage and more Vonage

Grok Headline matches for Broadband Surf Report: Vonage and more Vonage

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Texas Vonage suit: here's what Vonage is
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Texas Vonage suit: here's what Vonage is
'guilty' of 03/23/2005 02:29 AM
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What looks good in broadband news for Jan. 5.

Broadband Surf Report: Jan. 4

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Why Vonage is Just a Fad

Why Vonage is Just a Fad 05/20/2004 08:33 PM
ZDNet May 21 2004 0:40AM GMT

Vonage

Vonage 07/28/2004 03:08 PM

Start-up finds talk is cheap with Vonage: I've heard a lot about Vonage and seen their ads, but I was never able to pin down exactly what they did. Turns it its commercial Skype with hardware.

Its service is simple. Vonage sends customers an Internet phone box, which looks like a small cable TV box. The box plugs into most high-speed Internet connections. Almost any telephone plugs into the box.

The phone works like any other phone, but Vonage is routing the calls over the Web. (If the person on the other end of the line is not a Vonage user, the call will hop onto a regular phone line for the very last leg of its journey.)

This is the future.

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Vonage goes wireless

Vonage goes wireless 12/18/2003 11:57 AM
Getting the scoop once again, Om Malik reveals that Vonage is working on software that would let you use their broadband Voice over IP telephone...

Vonage, 2nd try for IP telephony

Vonage, 2nd try for IP telephony 12/17/2004 06:36 PM

Last summer I switched to lingo.com, an IP phone service that proved to be cheap but unreliable.  Starting last week Lingo failed altogether and their tech support folks (available only by phone, which is kind of irksome) failed to call back, so I ordered Vonage, which is the same $25/month but does not include Western Europe in its unlimited calling region and has higher international rates.

Here's how Vonage has worked...

• Vonage sends you a brand-new Linksys broadband router with included IP phone jacks and three Ethernet jacks; if you were relying on your old router for 802.11b or to use as an 8-port hub you may have to buy some new networking gear
• the customer service Web site is very slow and about 25% of the time page requests produce an error page with a "try again later" instruction
• tech support is available through a form on their Web site; this form asks for your name, phone number, account number, etc., even though you've already logged in and it should have all of his info as part of your account profile
• tech support via phone results in a "we're experiencing an unsually high volume of calls; try again later"; customer service (billing, etc.) can be reached after a 15-minute wait in queue
• they say that they never received my FAXed letter of authorization to transfer my old number from Lingo and want it refaxed
• when set to simultaneously ring my cell phone Vonage does ring the cell but I can't hear callers (they can hear me though)

They say that it will take two months for them to transfer the phone number from Lingo, so I'll have to pay $25/month to Lingo for forwarding until that happens.

[Update:  I believe that I unfairly maligned Vonage in regards to not being able to hear callers on calls simultaneously rung to my cell phone.  It turns out that it is my PalmOne Treo flaking out on the very day that I installed Vonage!  This makes Treo #10 that has failed, I think.  It lasted about two months, just like the others.  Anyone have a suggestion for a GSM phone that will do a calendar and contacts sync with Microsoft Outlook?]

[Dec 3 Update:  When voicemail is pending, the Vonage system fails to change the dial tone.  A second try to reach technical support (at 1:30 pm Eastern time) resulted in the same "we're too busy to talk to anyone" recording.  The voice quality of calls is somewhat low, with some constant static.]

Vonage goes to Canada

Vonage goes to Canada 04/13/2004 04:52 AM
Bell tolls for telcos

Vonage reviewed

Vonage reviewed 03/13/2003 10:24 AM
Raffi Krikorian's review of Vonage's Voice-over-IP phone-service is a great, info-civilian-oriented overview of the best way to secede from your phone company.

The Edison, New Jersey based company gives you one Cisco ATA186 and a phone number in an area code of your choosing (I had a little piece of northern New Jersey in my living room). You have a choice of two different levels of service to go along with this box: for $25.99/month you get unlimited local/regional calling (where local/regional is defined by the area code you choose for your phone number) and 500 minutes of free US long distance, and for $39.99/month you get unlimited long distance. And you also get international rates that rivals most common calling cards. The only problem is that the service only delivers one ATA186, and that specific model is required to use the service -- no other SIP compatible devices are supported yet. If you want to use more than one phone with the box, you will either have to rig up a network of telephone splitters and wires; or you can do what some have done and hack your house to plug the Cisco box into your house's in wall telephone network.

Link Discuss

Vonage softphone

Vonage softphone 12/19/2003 04:58 PM
Have been trying out the Vonage softphone with some success. My Laptop (IBM T40), like most, has built in speakers...

New: Vonage SoftPhone for Mac OS X

New: Vonage SoftPhone for Mac OS X 06/28/2004 09:54 AM
Vonage released a Mac OS X version of its SoftPhone software for use with its Voice Over IP telephone service.

Vonage Goes Portable

Vonage Goes Portable 12/18/2003 03:38 PM
Om Malik breaks the news that Vonage will soon have laptop and PDA-based software client for its service: It's not news that Vonage has tens of thousands of subscribers, nor that they offer a high-quality, full-featured hardware-based broadband voice-over-IP service that allows you to map multiple incoming real phone numbers to your virtual line. It also not news that you can get high-quality software VoIP clients; I'm personally enamored of Xten's suite, which work with Windows, Mac OS X, LindowsOS, and Linux. They're beautiful and come in free and paid flavors, including a multi-line conference version. The Xten clients can interface with any standard SIP (Session Initiation Protocol) server, and many of the VoIP providers who offer long-distance over the Internet use standard SIP gateways. But getting from Xten outbound to the VoIP provider is a pain: I had to have the CEO of Xten provide me the details for a couple of VoIP services; those details aren't on the VoIP long-distance service sites. Then there's the question of inbound service. Even though you can use Xten as the default client with Addaline.com, it's unclear whether you can receive inbound calls via their service. Most of the VoIP in software is focused on making calls to the PSTN and receiving calls from other folks using services like Free World Dial-up, which provides you with a free non-PSTN VoIP number and SIP gateway. Om's scoop is certainly that Vonage is going to package the software and PSTN offering into a no-configuration package that will be as easy to use as their hardware service. Vonage's hardware solution is pretty simple: open the box, plug it in, wait a minute. You're done. Voice mail calls can be alerted via email, and other features can be enabled through the Web site's dashboard for your account. Because Vonage works over broadband, a Pocket PC or a laptop equipped with their soft client in turn connected to a Wi-Fi hotspot or access point means free phone service everywhere -- it's another incentive to lower cell phone plans (for roaming purposes) and increase the number of hot spot locations. I'm a recent Vonage convert. I use my cell phone as my office and roaming line, and although I'd switched to a $130/month plan from Cingular because of their rollover minutes, I had $250 and $450 bills in September and October during particularly intense work periods. Yes, that's...

Vonage: Strike One

Vonage: Strike One 08/06/2004 03:25 PM
I was scheduled for a phone call with a VIP today, and when he got on the line (my office Vonage phone), it was unusable, multi-second delays on each voice round-trip. Damnably, I didn’t have my cellphone with me, so we had to reschedule. I called up Vonage, had to punch through two levels of slow menu (could be worse I suppose) to get to the tech support queue where I waited for five minutes listening to vasty echoing silence to talk to someone who put me on the tech support queue (“I thought this was tech support?” “No, I’m a general-purpose service representative.”) Which picked up after only a minute or two, and he made a vague attempt to blame my ISP and said he’d sent a couple of downloads to the phone that should address the problem. So, if it’s a known problem with a known fix, why don’t I already have it? I don’t have to do this kind of thing for either my land-lines or mobile. All in all, I’ve been fairly happy with Vonage so far, but much more of this could sour the relationship quickly.

Vonage-Click2Call-0.10

Vonage-Click2Call-0.10 09/21/2004 07:05 PM

Vonage arrives

Vonage arrives 03/06/2004 01:59 AM
My Vonage phone arrive yesterday afternoon. I followed the simple instructions for plugging it into my cable modem and now I'm making calls to anywhere in the US or Canada - 500 minutes/month for $15. So far, the sonic quality has been as good as a "real" phone. Yep, them Voice over IP bits can hold their own. And the plain ol' telephone company, the one with the network that's too smart for it's own good, ought to be worried....

NY Wants To Regulate Vonage

NY Wants To Regulate Vonage 05/20/2004 01:09 AM
Add New York to the list of greedy states along with California, Florida and Minnesota that want to get as much money out of VoIP providers as possible by declaring them phone companies. New York has become the latest state to declare Vonage a phone company that they can now regulate. This is a backwards step that is likely to slow down the acceptance of VoIP. While it may mean that the NY state government can suck a few extra taxes out of people, it will mean slower adoption, which means slower economic growth. Even worse, they're doing this while the FCC has made it clear that they're still reviewing this issue and had told states to leave VoIP providers alone while they come up with a position at the federal level. This is merely a short-term grab at extra tax revenue.

Vonage Now Available in Canada

Vonage Now Available in Canada 04/12/2004 03:37 PM
Techfocus Apr 12 2004 8:10PM GMT

States gang up on Vonage

States gang up on Vonage 04/11/2005 05:46 PM
ZDNet Apr 11 2005 9:50PM GMT

Notes and Tips: Vonage on Mac OS X

Notes and Tips: Vonage on Mac OS X 06/01/2004 10:45 AM
Vonage apparently has voice-over-IP software for Mac OS X.

Vonage hangs up on some callers

Vonage hangs up on some callers 08/12/2004 02:40 PM
VoIP company suffers "delays," the second glitch in two weeks. Those affected are told to reboot their adaptors.

Vonage to take VoIP on the road

Vonage to take VoIP on the road 01/04/2005 05:51 PM
ZDNet Jan 4 2005 7:13PM GMT

Vonage Drops Price

Vonage Drops Price 05/17/2004 02:56 PM
Vonage sends word that they've dropped their Residential Unlimited Plan from $34.99 to $29.99 per month. Seriously, that's it. Jesus wept, etc. Move along. Read [Vonage]...

Vonage to Introduce Wi-Fi Phone

Vonage to Introduce Wi-Fi Phone 01/04/2005 03:18 PM
Broadband telephone company Vonage is expected to announce plans Tuesday for a Wi-Fi phone that could make calls through a customer's wireless home network or at wireless hotspots, USA Today reported Tuesday. Vonage says it would work like a cell phone, but would not cost the subscriber any additional fees to use the service.

Vonage SoftPhone for OS X coming

Vonage SoftPhone for OS X coming 06/18/2004 02:14 PM
Vonage is expected to release the final version of its SoftPhone client for Mac OS X next week, according to VoIP Daily...

Vonage Wins Another Round—for Now

Vonage Wins Another Round—for Now 07/01/2004 01:53 PM
New York State has been enjoined from regulating the VOIP service provider for the remainder of 2004.

Vonage, SBC Fight Over 911 Calls

Vonage, SBC Fight Over 911 Calls 03/30/2005 11:08 PM
Vonage is in a bit of hot water over its E911 efforts lately -- though, it seems to mostly be a political ploy. However, now comes the news that Vonage approached SBC last month about running a private trial of an E911 service that would require SBC to give Vonage access to some routers and databases. SBC refused, pointing out that if they work privately with Vonage, there are a hundred other VoIP providers who will want to work privately with them also. They would prefer to come up with standards across the board that everyone can use -- which makes a lot more sense. While Vonage's request was a bit silly, it does show they know how important the VoIP-911 issue is becoming. Update: Of course, some are claiming this means VoIP E911 service will be held up -- which is ridiculous. This is only about delaying E911 for Vonage's proprietary method of doing E911. In this case, SBC is right. There should be a standard way, across the board for VoIP providers to do E911 and connect with the telcos.

Notes and Tips: Vonage

Notes and Tips: Vonage 06/02/2004 10:32 AM
Harris Upham shares his initial experience with Internet phone calls from his Mac.

Vonage Offers Wi-Fi Phone

Vonage Offers Wi-Fi Phone 01/04/2005 12:45 AM
Engadget slips the news that Vonage ships its F-1000 Wi-Fi handset: The handset will work over hotspot networks allowing Vonage customers to use their service while roaming. Boingo and Vonage had a deal in place to test out VoIP over Wi-Fi hotspots, but it's unclear here in the late evening how that ties together. Also, Vonage's site doesn't yet list the announcement, so we don't know if they've partnered with various networks to ease authentication. Authentication, or providing credentials that let you use a given hotspot network--whether a paid login or a WPA encryption key or handling 802.1X, even--is the biggest stopping block in allowing VoIP over hotspot to work. A technology like EAP-SIM, which would use a GSM SIM module to authenticate, might be one method of logging in. But it requires every hotspot or hotspot network that wants to allow this sort of connection to build the back-end to handle it....

Vonage Goes VoWiFi -- How Big Is The
Market?

Vonage Goes VoWiFi -- How Big Is The
Market? 01/04/2005 06:57 AM
Vonage is about to pick up quite a bit of press coverage for their unveiling of "plans" to offer a WiFi phone that will work with their service. It wasn't a secret that they were working on such a plan, and it sounds like this isn't so much a launch as it is a confirmation that they plan to launch it at some point (giving them an extra chance at getting some publicity). The phone, expected to cost about $100, will let subscribers use their Vonage VoIP accounts from WiFi hotspots, but there are a bunch of questions. While this does appear to be one of the first widely marketed attempts at consumer VoWiFi, it's still not clear there's really that much demand for this type of solution. Most people savvy enough to want one of these will already have a mobile phone. While it's true that VoIP won't eat up minutes the way cellular plans do, most cellular plans offer such large buckets of minutes and free long distance, making them effectively flat-rate as well. Even if the calls are international, things like VoIP bridges offer a reasonable solution for a mobile phone user who wants to make cheap international calls. Furthermore, it requires people to carry yet another device -- and, in this case, one that probably has a fairly short battery life, considering the rate at which WiFi consumes power. It's also unclear how the phone manages to log onto fee-based or subscription-based WiFi hotspots, without which the phones usefulness could be diminished even further. Also, it's doubtful that these phones can handle handoff between different access points without dropping a call, which forces you to be somewhat stationary when using the phones. The whole thing is a bit reminiscent of the old Rabbit Phones in the UK. Yes, there are some people who will find it useful, but it's likely to be a fairly small number. I could see it being useful for some people who just want to use it in their homes, but don't want to go through the trouble of wiring a phone up to an adapter that's across the home. Also, it would be easier than bringing along the adapter for someone who travels frequently to places with WiFi. However, it would seem that if anything along the lines of a VoWiFi solution would make sense, it would be much more likely to be something merged with a mobile phone so you would just carry around a single device. That means either having the carriers offer it (and that's not likely any time soon -- or with much enthusiasm if they ever get around to it, as they have no desire to eat away at their own minute plans) or letting people install a softphone on a smartphone that has WiFi.

Vonage expands UK service

Vonage expands UK service 03/23/2005 12:46 PM
But gets into hot water with the state of Texas

Vonage VoIP Stops Working

Vonage VoIP Stops Working 08/02/2004 03:18 PM
One of the few remaining hurdles for most users concerning any plan to ditch a traditional landline and go completely VoIP is the reliability of the service. If your power goes out: no VoIP. If your broadband connection goes down: no VoIP. Now, Vonage, the leader of the independent VoIP providers just convinced a bunch of people to hold off a little longer by having their own internal problems, so that many users couldn't make outgoing phone calls for an hour and a half this morning. There are plenty worse things in the world that could happen, but people are used to being able to pick up their phone and dial without having to worry about whether or not a dialtone exists. Update: Turns out Vonage wasn't the only VoIP provider having problems. Over in Hong Kong, two independent VoIP providers are accusing broadband provider PCCW of disrupting their VoIP connections on purpose -- to keep people using PCCW's landlines. It seems unlikely that the same thing happened with Vonage, but it does raise that issue of network neutrality again.

Vonage to Uncle Sam: Hands off VoIP

Vonage to Uncle Sam: Hands off VoIP 02/12/2004 02:18 PM
With debate over future of VoIP heating up, Vonage Holdings CEO Jeffrey Citron weighs in on the debate.

Vonage slashes price of Net telephony
kit

Vonage slashes price of Net telephony
kit 06/02/2004 06:12 PM

Minnnesota to appeal FCC Vonage ruling

Minnnesota to appeal FCC Vonage ruling 01/06/2005 05:41 PM
WASHINGTON - The Minnesota Public Utilities Commission (PUC) plans to appeal a November decision by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) prohibiting states from regulating VOIP (voice over Internet Protocol) services, such as those offered by Vonage Holdings.

Texas sues Vonage over 911 problem

Texas sues Vonage over 911 problem 03/22/2005 04:51 PM
ZDNet Mar 22 2005 6:50PM GMT

Vonage may route 911 call to Congress,
FCC

Vonage may route 911 call to Congress,
FCC 03/30/2005 09:02 PM
The Net phone provider considers asking for help solving problems with SBC over subscriber access to the 911 emergency call network.

Vonage voice over IP service comes to
Mac users

Vonage voice over IP service comes to
Mac users 06/24/2004 09:56 AM
As expected, Vonage announced today that it has completed interoperability testing of an OEM (original equipment manufacturer) version of Xten's X-PRO SIP SoftPhonefor Mac-based Vonage subscribers...

Vonage Making VoIP For Dummies?

Vonage Making VoIP For Dummies? 01/09/2004 09:50 PM
For years, VoIP systems were slow to catch on for two very big reasons: (1) the quality really wasn't that great and (2) they were a pain to set up. The quality issue has pretty much gone away, and Vonage should get some credit for creating a popular solution that solves the second problem. Setting up a Vonage line is painfully easy, and makes many people think it's just an alternative phone line - rather than having them think about the fact that it's actually VoIP. Now, they're going one step further. They've teamed up with TI to build a single chip that will basically include Vonage's software features - making it much easier for companies to build hardware that will act as a Vonage phone. While, on the face of it, this may seem like a boring technology partnership, Om Malik points out that this is another step in the "Vonage Everywhere strategy, where they expand the possibilities of where and how you use the Vonage system. This is, indeed, big news. In fact, one of my issues with Vonage was that, in making it seem exactly like a standard phone system, they were actually losing some of the advantages that VoIP provided them. This partnership suggests that the "looks like a phone, acts like a phone" strategy got them out into the market, but they know they now need to take that and expand it beyond what traditional phones can do.
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Broadband Surf Report: Vonage and more Vonage

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