Posted 11:29 p.m. by Jim Courtney

PhoneGnome offers Relevance-based Call Management with Iotum's Relevance Engine .

Over the past few months I have been a beta tester for the iotum Relevance Engine which has a number of interesting applications that are providing a taste of what my future real-time communications activities may have in store.

One of the first applications that Iotum has built automatically manages incoming phone calls and directs them in context to an appropriate home, business or mobile number or to voice mail. Iotum’s engine is an expert system that understands my work environment and helps me prioritize which calls are important and which ones can wait, under different circumstances based upon:

• Who’s calling
• What I am currently doing and my schedule for today (according to Outlook)
• My availability (according to MSN Messenger)
• My assignment of up to five priorities for my Outlook contacts, and
• My designated business hours

Martin Geddes included a request for such a call management service in his "wish list" of premium services for which he'd "gladly pay some small up front fee and a regular subscription" charge as part of a proposed Skype bundle for small business.

For a benchmark example of a response Skype can now look to iotum; this agreement between PhoneGnome and iotum demonstrates a revenue generating service that manages my calls based on my work environment.

One of my challenges as a beta tester of iotum, was their assignment of a new phone number in order to participate in their trial. However, I have a lot invested in my current business number. My workaround was to forward my regular business phone number to an assigned "iotum" number and then have the call processed by the iotum engine based on the above factors. Not a simple, lowest cost, user friendly process for achieving this goal – but it's a beta test, right?.

This all changes today with the announcement of a partnership between Iotum and TelEvolution, whose PhoneGnome appliance has received widespread acclaim for its unique ability to seamlessly merge PSTN and VoIP services. PhoneGnome enhances a traditional phone line with a VoIP service that provides an automatic least cost routing of outbound calls via either the PSTN if a "local" no charge call or a "long distance" call over a designated VoIP service if calling outside the local calling zone. At the same time, as with all VoIP services, it provides the ability to add calling features such as Call Waiting, Call Forwarding, No Answer Transfer, etc. managed through a web interface yet maintains access to essential services such as E911, home alarm systems and 800 numbers.

As a result of this announcement, PhoneGnome now adds an intelligent call routing and management service: the ability to direct inbound calls according to "Relevance" of the caller in the correct context at the time of the call. For instance, if the caller is a key "VIP" customer, it would be forwarded to my mobile number, unless I was currently in a meeting in which case it would be sent to voice mail. But, if iotum identifies via Outlook that this caller is someone with whom I have a meeting scheduled later in the day, the call would be sent to my mobile phone regardless of my current availability status. Another input to the handling of a call may also be my current MSN Messenger status. It's all very powerful and the Iotum expert system works automatically and transparently, in the background changing my call management preferences as I go about my day working between my home computer, my laptop and scheduling and attending meetings. I set the rules; I get to change the rules.

The key breakthrough about this announcement is that with PhoneGnome, Iotum can now be incorporated into your existing phone service:

• no need to get a new phone number (or to have number portability),
• no need to wait for the legacy phone company to offer the Iotum service.
• PhoneGnome users will get some of the innovative new applications that Iotum is building around their Relevance Engine (such as the Iotum-Pronto Conference Call Manager demonstrated at DEMO 2006)

It does require you also have a broadband Internet service. Simply purchase the PhoneGnome appliance and pay a monthly fee for the Relevance-based call management service. There is no ongoing subscription charge for the PhoneGnome appliance itself; you do need to sign up with a VoIP service for handling long distance calls at low VoIP rates which are usually a combination of a monthly fee for North American calls and per minute rates for overseas calls.

As Bruce Stewart says in his more detailed description and review of this partnership,

"This deal makes sense on so many levels. Both services are really easy to set up and use and complement each other nicely."

From a market perspective:

• Outlook is the most widely adopted Personal Information Manager in the enterprise space
• Sources of contextual information (information that can help identify where I am and what I might be doing) can potentially come from additional IM applications such as Skype, Yahoo and AOL
• VoIP-based solutions, including solutions incorporating Skype, are driving down the costs associated with implementing and operating PBX’s across geographically dispersed enterprises
• Voice 2.0 services, such as Iotum’s call management, are agnostic with respect to service providers, hardware vendors and carriers
• The combination of Iotum and PhoneGnome bridges Voice 2.0 services into Voice 1.0 phone installations.

I think we're going to see a lot of partnerships of this caliber with iotum. And the potential partners are Skype, Yahoo, MSN and AOL at the consumer level or one of the PBX providers such as Nortel, Panasonic, Linksys (Cisco), Avaya or any other potential VoIP-based PBX manufacturers at the enterprise level. The major question is: when will these players realize that offering intelligent premium services, such as the Iotum Relevance-based Call Management service, is a key stepping stone to their future growth beyond the legacy telephone system.

Posted 6:36 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Both Mark Evans and Alec Saunders have been making posts about the early days of Microsoft Internet Explorer. Mark wonders where the browser world would be if IE never happened; Alec comes from the viewpoint of a former IE Product Manager: browsers are a feature and not a product.

To add some pre-history from someone who was there: Mark Andreesson and some of his grad school colleagues had developed the Mosaic Web browser at the University of Illinois Champagne-Urbana ("UICU"). UICU then went out and sought licensees; Quarterdeck Corporation (of DESQview and QEMM fame) was the first licensee, signing an agreement with UICU in February or March of 1994. Then Marc went off with Jim Clark to form Mosaic Communications in early April 1994 (I can still visualize seeing the WSJ article announcing their startup).

UICU realized they may have something that could be a royalty generator and signed a deal that resulted in the creation of Spyglass as a commercial entity which received the worldwide rights to license Mosaic on behalf of UICU. In the summer of 1994 Quarterdeck went through a restructuring (in which I was personally involved on the sales and marketing side); their engineers decided to build a web browser from scratch even though they had licensed rights to the UICU Mosaic code; these rights at the UICU end had been transferred to Spyglass.

However, since QEMM was so highly pirated, Quarterdeck was seized with a software piracy "protectionist" mentality such that they missed the iterative “sharing” culture of the Internet. Meanwhile Marc and his colleagues developed their Netscape product from scratch (they never had a UICU/Spyglass license) and made their beta builds available on the Internet for testing and feedback starting in September 1994. (Clark et al were forced to change their company name from Mosaic Communications to something else - Netscape - as a result of a potential lawsuit by Spyglass who felt they owned the Mosaic name.) By the time Netscape launched an official release version in the spring of 1995, they had a very large, worldwide user base.

Quarterdeck released its product in May of '95 but never got market share or traction; the world had already gone Netscape as the default browser. Never was sure how much real revenue Netscape was generating in its initial post-release days but, as Alec has mentioned, it certainly "sold" as a stock on Wall Street.

Another recollection: At Quarterdeck we ended up re-negotiating the royalties, initially set at $5.00 per license with UICU, down to $0.50 per license with Spyglass. Eventually Microsoft came along, recognized a browser was a feature, not a product, and went on to embed IE within Windows. Zap goes any revenue model. So to put a conclusion to Mark's question about where the world would be without IE -- any browser product would have been a component of a larger offering -- either as an infrastructure application or in a developer toolkit.

Quarterdeck was eventually sold to Symantec in 1998 as Symantec needed a Windows Uninstaller to avoid a copyright lawsuit on another Uninstaller product they had -- Quarterdeck had CleanSweep. If I recall correctly, shareholders got $0.65 a share for a stock that had traded as high as $39 in late 1995.

One final note: one feature of the Quarterdeck browser has never made it to Internet Explorer to date - an ability to open multiple web pages in windows within a single "master" browser window. Was a great feature that has only over the past year gained widespread popularity, first in Firefox and potentially in MSIE 7.0: now it's called "Tabs".

Posted 9:39 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Alec Saunders tonight has written about his experience while checking into the Toronto Sheraton Centre Hotel for his attendance at the upcoming Voice over Net Canada conference. With an allergy to smoke, I guess I will not be using Sheraton (or any of the Starwood) hotels as a preferred choice.

Simon Cooper, a senior executive at Marriott, and a graduate of the same Executive MBA program I took twenty-one years ago, said his biggest fear as a hospitality industry executive was that his lowest paid employees were the ones in constant contact with the customer. I can say I have seen several instances, in hotel chains he managed (Delta and later Marriott) where these employees were empowered to do spontaneously whatever it took (within reason) to satifsy the customer. The most recent example is outlined in my post about the vandalisim inflicted on my new Volvo S60 three weeks ago where the staff at a nearby Courtyard Marriott assisted me in several ways with no questions asked. There is a reason Courtyard Marriott tends to be my preferred hotel chain.

Posted 10:09 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Prior to the Winter Olympics I reported on my acquisition and setup of the SlingBox such that I could watch the CBC version of the Olympics while traveling in southern California. At the time SlingBox was only available in the U.S.; I had purchased one on my trip to California immediately prior to the start of the Olympics. In addition to the points made in that posting I can also relate the following:

During a Skype chat session with an acquaintance in Sweden, I was watching the Olympic Opening Ceremony via my SlingBox as was my correspondent who was watching the Swedish TV network version. All of a sudden we found ourselves diverging to a discussion about various aspects of the ceremony. I guess you could call this coviewing!

During our trip we, of course, watched my home cable channels via SlingBox from our various hotel rooms; free broadband did enter into the decision about choice of hotels. One hotel charged for broadband access; however, their free breakfast more than made up for the daily Internet charge.

On one of our transit days, we stopped at a Starbucks in Palm Springs, CA and watched the CBC telecast of the Women's Gold Medal Hockey Game. I did record on my digital camera a video of the team singing O Canada via my SlingBox; they definitely should stick to hockey for their livelihood. Congratulations on a great performance!!

Rogers, my Internet (and cable TV) provider, has started providing individual Internet usage statistics to its customers. I was away from the home office for 12 days in February of which 10 were days when I had the SlingBox available. Whereas my January usage was 8.7GB download and 1.1GB upload; my February stats showed 5.8GB download and a whopping 11.0 GB upload. Given Alec's experience with Rogers "unlimited" wireless charges, I have a bit of trepidation about hearing from the Rogers usage police, probably suspecting I am running a highly accessed web server (Not!).

Last weekend I set up a High Definition (HD) television set; this necessitated moving to the Scientific Atlanta 8300HD cable box from the SA3250. Once I had completed the setup (and moved the appropriate cables to the 8300HD) I found my SlingBox player was still running on the desktop PC in my home office (without so much as touching the PC). The one caveat: the S-video output on the 8300HD only provides a Standard Definition signal -- quite suitable for SlingBox. However, since the TV itself is hooked up to the 8300HD via the HDMI cable, I cannot use the SA8300HD's PVR features on the SlingBox. There is also occasionally an annoying message about a "DVI/HDMI connection blocked" if the main TV is not turned on; however, simply hitting the Exit button on the remote control panel solves this.

In two days (Thursday, March 30) SlingBox will be announcing availability for purchase in Canada.

And now to install the Mobile player on my Dell Axim..

Posted 1:22 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Last Thursday evening I returned to my new car (50 km) after a business meeting in a restaurant to find the rear driver's side window smashed .... And my laptop stolen! This has resulted in an experience that has been both frustrating (in terms of working out a recovery plan) and exhilarating (in terms of the many friends who have helped in one way or another over the past few days). It shows the value of long term relationships and how they can come to assist in an emergency in invaluable ways. (Does the word "priceless" come to mind?)


First my thanks go to my Volvo dealer of the past 32 years, Volvo of Mississauga, (formerly McMillan & Saunders) who ensured that I could have my car available for a close family friend's wedding on Saturday. They bent over backwards to find replacement parts and provide a oeprationally repaired vehicle by 4:30 Friday. All without knowing how we would get this paid for, since the new auto had not been fully entered in the insurance company's computer.

Secondly, I need to thank my long time colleague and friend (he would call me "brother" as he does his wide range of acquaintances), Victor Shepherd, whom I have assisted with his computing needs over the past several years. As both an academic and author, Victor may not understand the technology but is a classic example of someone who avails himself of the benefits of technology to meet his goals. I had the pleasure of first meeting Victor in 1978 when he began a 21 year tenure as our minister. Victor has loaned me his unopened Dell Inspiron 6000 so that I can have an interim laptop PC while ordering a new one. (And finally I am able to get around to getting his new laptop operational).

I must also acknowledge the staff at the Courtyard Marriott in Vaughan. Without a question, they provided me with a large bath towel to cover up the window opening for driving home; they also allowed me to park under their entrance arch such that the rain was kept from getting into the car while I had a business meeting. Simon Cooper is a senior manager with Marriott and also a graduate of the same EMBA program as I took. The staff's response is typical of Simon's mantra and biggest fear about running a hospitality operation: the staff most in contact with the public are your lowest paid employees -- make sure they are empowered to act in a responsible manner in resolving customer issues. I have seen this repeatedly in operations run by Simon. (Disclosure -- I am a Marriott Rewards member and also qualify for their Senior's rate where "Senior" is not as old as it used to be.)

Many other friends have offered help; also my network of business clients and colleagues have been more than patient for the past few days as I worked through a plan not only to recover my data and get operating but also to minimize the exposure to identity theft and access to my Internet-accessible accounts. Fortunately I had most of my data (and almost all my business-critical data) backed up; the largest issue was figuring out how to do this while encountering Microsoft's and Symantec's activation algorithms.

And a simple message to prevent it happening to you: don't leave anything exposed in your car. Thieves have been know to break in to steal any type of briefcase or suitcase, with contents such as "exercised" gym clothes, estate settlement papers, etc. according to stories that have surfaced over the past few days. Also I have learned that they only want to steal the laptop to sell the hard drive for drug money. Somehow the economics don't work out when you get less than $100 for the effort (you can buy a laptop hard drive for under $150 retail); it only goes to show the degree of desperation and addiction that comes from such a habit. I would blame as much as anything our collective failure to recognize and support the importance of extra-curricular activities at the high school age. Instead of athletics, music and special interest clubs, more kids are susceptible to the short term temptations of a quasi-criminal, chemically-assisted life style in the resulting "spare" time. I often credit participation in these extra-curricular activities, and the teachers who lead them, as major contributors to my own offsprings' successes.

Ironically, once I got a chance to read the new car's manual Friday evening (yes I did read the manual! ... eventually), I learned there is a way to lock the trunk such that even if someone enters the main vehicle the trunk remains locked.

In future posts I will be acknowledging the tools that have allowed me to get back up so quickly along with a story of "does the fact Hell rhymes with Bell and Dell have anything to do with pushing their customers around in circles when attempting to reach a human voice"? And, finally I hope to have some suggestions as to how computer and Internet technology can be used to investigate these activities.

Posted 11:34 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Shel Israel was the guest of AIMS Canada for two events involving the use of blogs as an element of business marketing, building on the cases discussed in Naked Conversations, the book he recently co-authored with Robert Scoble.

The Blogger Networking Event, held at Shoeless Joes in Toronto's Entertainment district, presented lots of opportunities for naked verbal conversations.

Social Marketing, Tapping into the Power of Connected Customers, was the second AIMS event featuring Mark Evans, Amber MacArthur, Jon Husband and Shel. (Note I did not attend the first AIMS event which apparently had the dullest audience Shel has ever encountered.)

Both were great events and provide even more justification for the first Toronto Web 2.0 conference being organized by Mark Evans, Matthew Ingram and others for May 8 and 9. More information to be available next week.

In the confusion caused by renovations back home, Shel forgot his passport. Apparently there ensued a very long un-naked conversation as he applied to enter Canada at Pearson Airport. Shel reports that verbal diarrhea works as a successful strategy for such a discussion with a Canadian immigration officer. However, more importantly and ironically, he needed to have his passport Fedexed up to Toronto in order to be able to re-enter the U.S., his home and native land.

Mar 8 Update: Shel has done an autobiographical report on his trip.

Posted 11:29 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Temporary Posting


1999 S70 GLT with almost 185,000 km in excellent condition:

All factory recommended servicing carried out

GLT 2.4L Lite Turbo 190hp engine

Forest Green Sedan

4-speed Automatic Transmission; Front Wheel Drive

Leather seats

Air Conditioning; Power Locks, Steering, Windows and Side Rear View Mirrors

Power Drivers Seat with 3 memories

Front seat heaters

Cruise Control

AM/FM Radio with single CD player

Includes set of snow tires on wheels

More specs and safety features/ratings

Fuel capacity: 70L

Was covered under extended warranty to 160,000 km

All service records available

Recent repairs: timing belt (at recommended 168,000 km); alternator, front brakes, PCV system

This car still has the smooth ride (especially with the summer tires) and excellent handling referenced in the review linked above. A pleasure to drive. Upgrading to 2006 S60 in order to get steering wheel control of radio/CD player.(And I'm a bit of a digital geek.)

Price: C$7,995 plus taxes.
VIN: YV1LS56D3X2613012
Ontario UVIP available at time of inspection.
905-812-0202 or



Last looks....

Posted 9:26 a.m. by Jim Courtney

Earlier this week I wrote about my experience installing a SlingBox so that I could watch the CBC "Live" coverage of various events in real time. And I have had a few days now to experience SlingBox working at a distance of 2500 miles from my cable box.

This morning my hotel-distributed USA Today ran a feature story on how viewership of the Olympics is down - 36% from the 2002 Salt Lake City Winter Olympics, for instance. But they make several points:

More Americans are checking the Internet for results in real time; by the time NBC runs their daily prime time coverage, the information has largely become stale. One quote: "Even when they try to tell gut wrenching stories, it just doesn't motivate me to watch".

Website visits to NBC's Olympics site are up significantly. "For anyone who can't see the Winter Olympics live, the Internet is the obvious outlet of choice."

A couple living near the Canadian border in Troy, MI is quoted: "My husband and I have discussed the fact that watching NBC's coverage is frustrating because they edit it so much we only get to see what they want us to see," Taylor says. "We like all of the athletes, and Canadian TV provides that."

For the 2010 Winter Olympics at Whistler-Vancouver watch for the following from the US coverage:

Real time coverage (from a site only three hours behind the key US Eastern market), probably with expanded coverage on the US rights holder's affiliated cable channels such as MSNBC and CNBC.

Much more Olympics via Video on Demand (as Rogers Cable is currently providing for this year's Olympics)

New business models for advertisers who want to reach their target markets more effectively

And from SlingBox: opportunities to watch from not just your home cable box but from a range of sources, such as the Canadian rights holder for 2010, contracted by SlingBox Media to provide a remote "reality Olympics" video source.

One more Internet-driven media transformation leading to one more business model disrupted by the Internet.


Now, while in my hotel room in southern California, back to watching Mellisa Hollingsworth-Richards being interviewed about her Bronze medal performance in Skeleton yesterday.

Posted 8:54 a.m. by Jim Courtney

(written on Day 2 of the 2006 Winter Olympics)

During the summer of 1972 I moved to Germany (working with a private firm) about three weeks before the Munich Olympics started. As my wife had remained in Canada to help her parents with a move, I was getting my evening meals in the local town "gästehaus". When the Olympics started, the local German network provided 16-hour a day coverage from 9 a.m. to midnight. As a result I would spend my entire evenings in the gästehaus watching the Olympics(and upgrading my high school German in the process). I became an Olympic TV junkie and have been entranced by the round-the-clock Canadian coverage that has been provided with every Olympics since Montreal hosted the 1976 Summer Games.

During a recent trip to the U.S. I stayed with some friends who gave me a demonstration of not only TiVo but also the newly released SlingBox. So when I realized at the end of that trip that I would be spending the first ten days of this year's Winter Olympics in the Los Angeles area without access to the CBC, I resolved to have a SlingBox installed at my (Canadian) home prior to my trip this coming week. (I certainly did not want to be restricted to NBC's "summary" prime time broadcasts that only cover U.S. athletes.) An interim quick trip to U.S. gave me the opportunity to purchase a SlingBox last week (and, yes, I declared it at customs).


This is one amazing box. The most difficult part of the installation was figuring out the wiring maze I had put together when I installed my home theatre system. The rest of the installation went quite smoothly. Simply position the SlingBox between your cable box and home stereo amplifier; attach an Ethernet cable to the home network (via a Linksys Cable/DSL Router or equivalent) and place the IR generator and its cable such that it can trigger the "Remote Control" functions of your cable box. Oh yes, do connect the power adapter!

Run the installation software on your Internet-attached PC and presto, your entire TV functionality has been migrated to your laptop PC. It was one of the smoothest installations I have executed in years. One further test: I wanted to confirm that my home TV could be viewed from anywhere on the Internet, so my next trip to a HotSpot-equipped Starbucks gave me that opportunity.


The picture on the left (captured during the opening ceremony on Friday afternoon)demonstrates the overall excellent picture quality. The only time it gets the least bit fuzzy is when I expand it to cover the full 1680 x 1050 resolution of my Dell Inspiron. (No, you cannot record the video feed from SlingBox; recording with access via remote control requires a TiVo box. This picture was captured using Snag-It.)

A few comments:

It allows me to view the programming I am already paying for through my Rogers Cable subscription. And I would still have to pay for any PPV programming.

There can only be one external viewer with access to the feed at a time; this avoids any accusation that SlingBox is facilitating "broadcasting" in any illegal manner with respect to the delivery of programming.

You do have total control of the cable box (including turning it off and on).

Make sure you establish some "rules" with the person who normally views the TV set; you do have to watch whatever is being shown on the same TV (unless you acquire a second cable box that is independent of your primary TV setup)

So next week I will be one of the few Canadians able to watch the CBC's full coverage of the Olympics while at a location in the U.S. that is well beyond the US-Canada border. SlingBox has solved my Olympic-size problem!

Posted 10:08 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Last week I reported on my visit to Iotum's offices where they demonstrated not only their Relevance Engine in operation but also the Pronto Conferencing audio conferencing product they were about to introduce at DEMO 2006 yesterday. A superbly well executed presentation in spite of one technical glitch.

Last night they learned that they are "DEMO Gods" having won an award for one of the top ten presentations amongst the 70 or so given over the previous two days. As they flew home I received Messenger messages from them recovering from their shock as they floated along on cloud nine!

And now the real challenge begins ... bringing their products and ideas to market. It will be quite a ride for the entire Iotum team that will build on both Alec's and Howard's wealth of technology business experience.

Posted 11:31 p.m. by Jim Courtney

My oldest son, Brian, is a Founder with two partners of a medical device company, Kerberos Proximal Solutions, whose main product can assist with the removal of the blockage (thrombus) that can cause a heart attack. They got their first story in the public press today.

"Imagine a drainage ditch full of grass, mud and dirt at a certain point, preventing overflow water from draining properly through the ditch. Then imagine firefighters forcing a powerful stream of water at the point of the block, breaking loose the grass, mud and dirt at the same time that a powerful vacuum hose sucks away the debris, allowing water to once again flow smoothly through the channel." Only in Texas would they come up with such a descriptive analogy to the junk that can build up in our arteries!

Posted 11:08 p.m. by Jim Courtney

As mentioned elsewhere (see the Comments here), my neighbour's son, Brad Boyes, made the Boston Bruins this year as a rookie center. Well, he was supposed to be the fourth line center.... but as the season evolved and the injuries to Bruins players built up, Brad has ended up as a right wing on what is currently their number one line. So when the Bruins came to Ottawa last night, where my son and daughter are both registered at the University of Ottawa and home of my wife's brother, it was an opportunity for a family outing to watch our neighbour of the past 19 years.

Now I have been to many NHL rinks and it is most interesting to see what is concocted for the opening ceremony. Disney used to do an interesting job at The Pond, home of the Mighty Ducks, where the mascot arrives sliding down from the roof on a wire. Well, Ottawa seems to have a fetish about the colour red (even though sometimes they wear black and their "Away" colour is white). That opening worship of the colour Red pulsating at 430 billions times a second only served to pulsate the physicist in my background! Argh!!

I was not only looking forward to seeing Brad play but also some of Ottawa's star players such as Dany Heatley and Jason Spezza, both of whom had played with Brad on National Junior teams in the World Junior Championships. My biggest disappointment was finding out that Dominik "The Dominator" Hasek would not be playing goal. Instead they played their backup Ray Emery; last time I saw Brad play against Ray Emery (Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds @ Erie Otters , March 17, 2002), Brad's team had won. This served as an omen for what was to come.


First period. Fan in (red) Senators sweater behind me keeps shouting "Com'on boys, com'on boys". So Brad Boyes pops a pass to Patrice Bergeron who promptly puts it behind a bewildered Ray Emery. This fan keeps on shouting "Com'on boys, com'on boys". So this time Brad (#26) takes a pass from Marco Sturm and lobs it into the net. The Courtneys go crazy but the other 19,545 in the crowd of 19,551 go totally silent. Call Brad's Dad back in Mississauga between periods since no Senators fan will talk to me!



Second period. Four minutes after Nick Boynton scores a short handed goal to make it 3-0, Brad takes a shot that is rebounded to Sturm who promptly pops it in to make it 4-0. Then Sergei Samsonov closes out the scoring later in the period.

Third period: Senators outshoot Bruins 16-1 but nine-game goalie Tim Thomas (6-1-2) stops them all; in the end the Senators outshot them 44-24 over the game but whereas Emery only stopped 19, Thomas earned first star of the game with his 44-shot shutout. Brad gets second star for his best output of the season (1 goal, 2 assists taking him to 14 goals, 22 assists for his rookie season). Bottom line: the Bruins are fighting to get into a playoff position; the Senators were just plain flat. Omen fulfilled.

During the third period, Senators Marketing, promoters of the colour "Red", performed the sports marketing gaff of the season. After Ray Emery had given up five goals with little support from his teammates, they put up on the centre ice scoreboard a video of Ray thanking the fans for attending the game. However, we never heard what Ray had to say as his comments were drowned out in a vociferous chorus of boos.

After the game we met a smiling Brad Boyes who was the happiest person in the arena to have led his team to defeat of his former favorite NHL team (I believe his boyhood Senators jacket is gathering dust in a closet at home). And one of my other son's high school classmates showed up as well: Shaun Majunder of CBC's "This Hour has 22 Minutes". For those in Canada (or with access to CBC via their SlingBox), you can watch Shaun's interviews (as reporter Raj Binder) recorded at this game on this Friday evening's show (8:30 p.m.).

Clarkson High School reunion: Shaun Majunder, Joanna Courtney, Brad Boyes

And I get home to find an email from Alec (who occassionally blogs about the Senators): "....hope you enjoyed the hockey game tonight. Thank goodness I had email to do... YEEESH!"

By the way, at 14 goals and 22 assists Brad is now third in team scoring. Not bad for someone who was supposed to be a fourth line center.

Posted 10:37 p.m. by Jim Courtney

I had the occasion to visit with Alec and Howard at Iotum yesterday morning. In California you will find that many cars in employee parking lots have windshield covers placed immediately behind the windshield to keep out the sun's penetrating rays. In the Ottawa winter, especially during a freezing rain storm, you don't want ice to build up on your wipers, so notice how Alec (and just about everyone else in the parking lot) set up their wiper blades .....



On entering their office you are greeted not only by a highly enthusiastic and passionate team but also with reminders of what Iotum is about:



You can read about Alec's new Blackberry 8700r here and here. Alec gave me a full scale demo well beyond what he reported here. (I definitely want one.) But then Howard showed me his Black... uh ... Redberry; the only one in the world!



You wanted a closer look....



Of course they cannot talk about their product until after DEMO next week. Suffice it to say they were quite busy getting ready.

And you can read here about the reason for my trip to Ottawa along with the content of Alec's midnight email to me.

Posted 10:48 p.m. by Jim Courtney

Ever wonder how Ctrl-Alt-Del became the default for reboots. Check this out. I love the looks on Bill's face when he says "Bill made it famous". (Needs QuickTime player)

Posted 9:12 a.m. by Jim Courtney

Over the past month I have had need to look for a voice setup that:

is simple to use by non-technical personnel in a (small) office environment

allows the user to access both conventional PSTN phone connections as well as a VoIP connection

can instantly launch a VoIP or PSTN call from Outlook Contacts or a contact information in a web page in a web browser (IE, Firefox, etc.)

provides presence status, in either Outlook Contacts and/or Internet Explorer

allows the user to also listen to their traditional audio via Windows Media Player, Real Audio, MusicMatch, iTunes, etc.

does an automatic selection of audio devices associated with, say, the VoIP service and turns off the traditional audio when a call comes in

allows the user to select which headset/phone handset to use for voice calls along with traditional (Windows) audio functions

allows the user to have (remote) wireless audio connection to the source of the VoIP or phone service (whether a PC or dedicated handset).

OK, so this is a dream configuration but came closer to reality with all the announcements at CES last week. In the course of this search I have acquired and been evaluating a Linksys CIT200 Skype phone and a PhoneGnome setup.

The Linksys CIT200 Skype Phone brought home a fundamental problem with Windows that was first mentioned by Martin Geddes in a recent Telepocalypse post:

“I bought a Plantronics DSP-400 USB headset a while back. It came ‘Skype certified’ together with a small SkypeOut credit. I’m still happy with it. But it’s also very annoying to use. Because I like to listen to music from my laptop with real, quality headphones. Sometimes I unplug the headset when I move my laptop about, or want to use it on another PC, and Windows takes note and resets my audio devices to point to the built-in stuff. No matter how often I set my preferences in Skype to “Plantronics headset”, it keeps being turned back to Windows default each time I unplug. This is, needless to say (but I’ll say it anyway), not a good experience.”

My Linksys Skype Phone also came with small SkypeOut credit (which readily got added to my already implemented SkypeOut credits). However, the Windows audio setup is something else. When you install the software for the Skype Phone, it automatically changes both your Skype "Sound Devices" Options and your default Windows audio device to “CIT200” (from my normal SigmaTel Audio that drives my onboard or headset speakers/microphone. In this mode, none of the traditional audio will work (at least provide audio to my headset/laptop speakers). If I change the Windows default back to SigmaTel Audio, the Skype Phone sees the Skype Contacts; but the audio does not work. After trying various Windows Audio configurations I found:

The only way the Skype Phone sees the directory is if the Sound Devices in Skype Options is set to “CIT 200”,

The only way to get Skype Phone audio connections is to set the Windows Audio default to “CIT200”.

The only way to listen to Windows Media Player or other traditional audio players is to set Windows Audio default to SigmaTel.

Of course I also have several different physical devices for making the audio connection:

A PC headset to plug into my laptop for normal Windows Audio services

A Bluetooth headset that could work with Skype using the vitaero Skype Bluetooth headset driver (mono only with my Motorola HS820)

A Linksys CIT 200 phoneset (with a phone headset jack) for Skype use away from my PC (it does come with a wireless USB adapter)

A traditional phone handset (Nortel two-line that is about 12 years old)

Lots of audio hardware on my desk (but no DSP-400)!

I would like to see a Windows client that:

Automatically switches the Windows Audio amongst the various applications using Windows Audio as appropriate when the application comes up. (Would need rules to be setup but there can be a default set of rules.)

Automatically switches the connection to the appropriate headset that I happen to be using (in conjunction with the hardware box I am about to suggest)

And a piece of (USB-connected) hardware that can have the various headsets as inputs (microphone) and outputs (speakers or earpieces), software selectable from the Windows client above.

And, of course, to meet all my requirements, Skype for Outlook Toolbar and Skype for Internet Explorer Toolbar with appropriate API’s.

Will anyone take up the challenge? Skype (via their certification program requirements)? Linksys? Plantronics? PhoneGnome? D-Link? Creative? Any of those new (Skype hardware) vendors showing at CES? Or even Microsoft (maybe an opportunity for hardware along the lines of how the Microsoft Mouse and Keyboard products have become a market staple.)?

And, Microsoft, will you be able to address what amounts to a fundamental flaw in Windows Audio with respect to having a much more user friendly way to switch amongst audio devices than “Control Panel > Sounds and Audio Devices, select the Audio Tab and use the drop down boxes?” Not only for Windows Vista but also backwards compatible to Windows XP and 2000?