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GMail Labs Apps: 3 We Find Fun & 3 We Find Useful

Jason Harris — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 16:00:45 +0000

To the envy of developers everywhere, Google Software Engineers are granted what they call their “20% time.” As a result, Google coders get 20% of their working time to work on projects that the developers select away from management approval. Many well-known Google projects have resulted from 20% time, showing that the effort benefits the company as well.

Gmail, one of WWD’s favorite web based utilities, has been put into the spotlight as Google opened the door on Gmail Labs. This section of Gmail’s website will house new “beta” add-ins and features in an effort to gather feedback from users. To get to Gmail Labs, inside your Gmail settings pane, click on the Labs tab. Note: GMail is still rolling Labs out to users. If your Gmail doesn’t have it yet, check back a little later. It appears that this is only available to @gmail.com email addresses and not Google Apps addresses.

Anything web worker useful here? Let’s take a look.

To break down the features, I’ll divide them up into useful and fun categories:

Useful

Quick Links: This can be a shortcut to any page in Gmail. When I first saw this feature, I didn’t see at as being any different from a Label. However, do you have a custom search you do on a regular basis? Save it as a Quick Link. For example, if you want to see all the message from May 2008 with the keyword “Invoice” – you can now save it as a Quick Link for quick future access.

Custom Date Format: Outside of the United States, a date of 1/31/2008 might look odd. Save your dates to show the date first or alternatively, turn Gmail’s clock into a 24-hour clock if you’re used to this formatting.

Superstars: Have you ever want to star an item, but have it be a different from all the other messages you already starred? With Superstars, you can have additional star icons to display content with. Use one icon for work contacts, one for family, one for action items and so on.

Fun

Email Addict: if you spend way too much time on your email and in chat, use Email Addict to have the system force you to take a walk, make a phone call or otherwise reach some work/life balance.

Hide Unread Counts: if you are depressed by the unread count of email being a constant reminder of how much work you have lying ahead, hide the counter with this Labs add on.

Mouse Gestures: some computer users love using mouse gestures to navigate around their software applications. For instance, you can hold the right click button and move the mouse to the left to go to a prior conversation, or move the mouse up to go to the inbox. While not for everyone, mouse gestures might be a key way you like to move around within Gmail.

What are your impressions – are there some new features in Gmail labs that you feel now you couldn’t do with out?

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Scribd Launches New Feature to End Email Attachments

Jason Harris — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 18:00:06 +0000

Scribd is a document hosting service that we’ve touched on before that allows users to bring their documents into their online service for viewing and later use. Scribd recently launched a service called iPaper@Scribd that is aiming to do away with annoying email attachments by granting users the ability to convert documents to the company’s iPaper format.

Using iPaper@Scribd is drop dead simple. To get started, cc: ipaper@scribd.com in your outgoing email attachment and fire off the email. As a result all your other recipients will receive a link to the Sribd hosted document a few moments later. Alternatively, you can just email Scribd your document and forward on the link when you receive it back from your web service.

If you use the first option mentioned above, it may really annoy your email recipients. This is because they’ll receive two emails – one with the original attachment and a second Scribd email with a link to their version of the document.

On another note, considering you’re uploading business documents to the Internet, we would not recommend putting up business sensitive documents that may contain proprietary business information.

Scribd has been used to display business documents on blogs for a while and I think it will be a great tool for people who wish to share documents in a very easy manner.

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T-Mobile Offers Attractive New Family Plan

Jason Harris — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 16:00:49 +0000

Small business owners are always looking for smart ways to keep costs down while achieving useful practicality. Whether it’s running a business from your home office to avoid renting an office or completing administrative tasks sometimes best outsourced to a hired hands, business owners seek balance in profitability and efficiently running their businesses.

Additionally, US cellular service providers over the last few months have been rolling out “unlimited plans” that offer an unlimited bucket of minutes for one flat monthly rate. In most cases, $99 a month will give you unlimited chatters a way to talk all you want. Sprint’s plan is very attractive because it includes unlimited voice, data, and SMS.

However, T-Mobile put a new spin on the unlimited plan by offering an unlimited family plan. For example, if you have a $99 T-Mobile unlimited plan, you can add additional lines for just $49/month that will include unmetered national voice minutes, SMS, MMS, and instant messaging.

Small business owners may not know this, but this “Family” plan is not only usable by those who share genetic bonds. This is applicable to small business because for about $250 (not including taxes), you can have unlimited wireless minutes to run your business with. This type of value makes the offering very competitive and could be comparable to Internet telephony (VoIP) offerings. However, the beauty of this T-Mobile unlimited family plan is that you have access to your minutes no matter where your cell phone happens to be.

For more information about the new plans, see T-Mobile’s website.

Would you consider running your small business on cell phones? What tradoffs can you think of?

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LaterLoop Saves Web Pages With Unique Features

Jason Harris — Wed, 04 Jun 2008 19:00:19 +0000

Being able to bookmark and save web pages for future reference is a functionality that has been tried by many players, including Instapaper, toread, and Iterasi (previously covered). However, a new entrant called LaterLoop is approaching this web page saving space with some unique and interesting features.

Using LaterLoop couldn’t be easier. Begin by signing up on their web site. Because the service is built on Google’s App Engine (Google’s brand new application environment for web developers), if you have a Gmail (Google) account, you can just sign in. Otherwise, choose a username and password as normal when signing up for a web service.

Next, install their Firefox Bookmarklet which is displayed on the right. Now, while perusing the web, if you see a site you like and you want to save it for later, click the LaterLoop bookmarklet and the page will be saved for future reference in your LaterLoop account.

So far, LaterLoop doesn’t look all that different than the other bookmarking tools. However, to set itself apart, LaterLoop:

Is optimized for mobile phone users. So far similar services have released iPhone versions. LaterLoop takes it a step further by optimizing their service for BlackBerries, Nokias, and Windows Mobile devices as well.
has a great social feature. If you want to share a bookmarks, star it and it will then appear in an RSS feed you can publish out to your blog or simply share the RSS feed with your friends.
features an Airplane mode: this will allow you download a ZIP file of all your links for offline access.
allows you to grant granular permissions. You can set all of your bookmarked pages to be public, or just your starred ones.
supports the Firefox Scrapbook extension. This is an established Firefox extension that allows you to save sites on your computer for future reference.

After using LaterLoop to bookmark a few sites, it appears to be very functional. The offline capabilities make it an attractive offering as I travel to sites where Wi-Fi access can be hard to come by. Also, the mobile site looks fantastic on my Nokia phone.

LaterLoop has put together an attractive offering that is worth taking a look at.

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7 Ways to VoIP From Your Mobile Phone

Jason Harris — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 19:10:26 +0000

While the emergence of VoIP, or voice-over-Internet protocol, technology has already helped push down the cost of making a phone call, now it’s starting to have a deflationary impact on the world of mobile, where call charges remain stubbornly high.

In the meantime, the ongoing adoption of 3G broadband and the inclusion of Wi-Fi in many high-end phones is drawing a growing amount of attention to mobile VoIP services. Indeed, research firm Disruptive Analysis predicts that the number of VoIP-over-3G users will top 250 million by the end of 2012 — from virtually zero in 2007.

We at GigaOM are constantly tinkering with these mobile services, so we’ve put together a list of seven mobile VoIP apps that we think you’ll find handy.

Skype Options

Service: Skype Mobile
Platform/Network: Java-based application that works on 50 popular phones from Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and Samsung. Can be used on numerous cellular data networks.
Cost: Free
Features: Chatting (including with a group), presence settings (offline, online, do not disturb), and Skype-to-Skype calls (including SkypeIn).
Our Opinion: If your phone is supported, Skype Mobile is a great way to add Skype chatting and calls to it. Though it would be nice if the Skype application weren’t written in Java, as these applications are often sluggish and unstable.

Service: 3 Skypephone
Platform/Network: Uses a specialized handset. Currently available in the UK, Italy, Austria, Hong Kong, Australia, Ireland, Denmark and Sweden.
Cost: The phone costs £49.99 (about $98) and can be used on a pre-paid basis. Calls cost nothing if they’re made from Skype.
Features: Free Skype-to-Skype mobile calls and the ability to conduct Skype IM conversations, all without touching your computer.
Our Opinion: The 3 Skypephone is best suited for those who need a few monthly mobile minutes and wish to talk/IM to their Skype friends along the way. The pre-paid feature makes it an attractive and inexpensive option for Skype chatters in the geographies it serves.

Service: iSkoot
Platform/Network: Mobile handsets such as BlackBerry, Nokia, Windows Mobile and Palm OS models. Also works on GSM networks.
Cost: Modest to expensive, based on usage. Because iSkoot is a hybrid VoIP/GSM service, it uses SMS and mobile minutes when making and receiving calls or Skype IM messages.
Features: SkypeIn and Skype-to-Skype calls, Skype IM messages.
Our Opinion: iSkoot is a good option for keeping in touch with your Skype contacts. However, I would look at other software applications that just use data to send Skype SMS and Skype voice traffic.

Mobile VoIP Players

Service: Truphone
Platform/Network: Nokia handsets
Cost: Incoming free calls while on the Truphone network, low per-minute rates while on a GSM network. Outgoing calls are billed at very low per minute rates.
Features: Truphone offers free calls, SMS and voice mail while logged into the Truphone network via Wi-Fi. Otherwise, Truphone forwards calls to your mobile handset and you pay a low per-minute charge.
Our Opinion: With its smart forwarding options, Truphone is particularly useful for international travelers. Whether you’re on Wi-Fi or just your normal GSM network, you can be reached via your Truphone number no matter where you are (charges apply in certain cases, see their site for details). For times when Wi-Fi is not available, Truphone just released Truphone Anywhere, which utilizes local gateways for outgoing calls at low per-minute charges. I have trialed the service by forwarding calls from my Truphone number to my cell phone and the call quality was fantastic; voices were indistinguishable from any other cell phone call. A Truphone-to-Truphone VoIP call yielded even higher voice quality.

Service: Fring
Platform/Network: Nokia/Symbian handsets, Widows Mobile, iPhone (pre-release beta)
Cost: Free
Features: Allows you to make VoIP calls on any SIP network, Skype or to other Fring users. Additionally, Fring is a multi-protocol IM client that will allow you to chat with your buddies on Skype, MSN, ICQ, Google Talk, Twitter, AIM and Yahoo.
Our Opinion: I have used Fring to make SIP and Skype voice calls, and over EDGE the call is choppy and hard to understand. However, Wi-Fi provides enough bandwidth to make Fring calls clear and understandable. I wouldn’t say the quality is fantastic, but it is very comparable to a normal cell phone call.

Service: Talkonaut
Platform/Network: Available for Java-based phones, Symbian and Windows Mobile
Cost: Free
Features: Talkonaut offers free VoIP and IM chatting. For instant messaging, the application supports Google Talk, ICQ, AIM, and Yahoo. Talkonaut can also use SIP for VoIP calling.
Our Opinion: Talkonaut is a Russian offering and is still very new. The application was quite unstable on my Nokia N82 handset. With iffy performance and a very rusty user interface, I would recommend looking at other applications for this functionality, namely Fring.

Service: Nimbuzz
Platform/Network: Java program, Symbian; an iPhone version is coming soon.
Cost: Free
Features: Allows you to engage in IM conversations and conduct VoIP calls, as well as to share media such as photos and video. Nimbuzz also allows for client-to-client calls and has widgets enabling calls to originate from Facebok and MySpace. Compatible with Skype, Google Talk, AOL Instant Messenger, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo, MySpace, Facebook and Jabber IM networks.
Our Opinion: The Symbian application is very responsive and easy to use. A VoIP call originating from my Facebook page to Nimbuzz over a Wi-Fi connection sounded good — just as good as any call over a GSM network.

Service: Gizmo5 (formerly Gizmo Project)
Platform/Network: Nokia Symbian handsets, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Nokia Tablets
Cost: Free for VoIP calls, low per-minute charge to call landlines and to SMS to mobiles.
Features: Gizmo5 allows you to conduct voice calls to other Gizmo5 users and grants IM conversations with friends on Gizmo5, MSN, AIM, Yahoo and Jabber.
Our Opinion: Gizmo5 is a great competitor to Skype, just not as established or well-known. They have wisely developed their client software for many platforms including numerous mobile phones, and on both Mac and PC. VoIP call quality is stellar when calling between clients, as well as to landline/mobile phones.

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Starbucks Begins "Complimentary" Wi-Fi

Jason Harris — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 19:00:08 +0000

As forecast in a previous post, Starbucks has begun their complimentary Wi-Fi service. To get your two free hours of Wi-Fi, you must:

Create an AT&T Wi-Fi account
Have a Starbucks card (that can have as little as $5) on it and you must have used your Starbucks card once in the last 30 days.
And agree to be emailed (spammed) by AT&T up to 4 times a year.

Not a bad deal: get a Starbucks card and an Americano and you can have 2 hours to use their professionally managed and speedy Wi-Fi.

As another option for free Wi-Fi with your morning coffee, check out your local coffee shop and of course Boingo is also an option.

For more information on AT&T’s Wi-Fi Service, see their FAQ.

(Photo credit: Flickr User visualpanic)

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A Look at TruPhone Anywhere for International Callling

Jason Harris — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 17:00:09 +0000

When traveling abroad, making calls back home or otherwise can get very expensive, as alluded to in a previous post. With an unlocked GSM mobile phone, you can use the Orange service as discussed in the aforementioned link, or any other pre-paid GSM provider. However, what if you could combine the convenience of a mobile phone with the low-cost calling of a VoIP company.

A mobile VoIP company called Truphone is attempting to make international calling very inexpensive for travelers and other users of their service. Truphone is a program that runs on your Wi-Fi enabled mobile handset used the Internet to cheaply send and receive phone calls, much like to Skype on your PC. Truphone allows for cheap calling from your mobile phone when signed onto Truphone via Wi-Fi.

Truphone Anywhere is a new feature of the 4.0 version of their software. When you are out of range of a Wi-Fi hotspot, you can use Truphone Anywhere to take advantage of Truphone’s inexpensive international calling rates. To use the Truphone Anywhere service, dial an international number. TruPhone will use a call-through mode by using a domestic phone number as a bridge.

Truphone will first see if there is Wi-FI available and if so, will route the call accordingly. Otherwise, the handset calls your local Truphone gateway (depending on which country you’re in currently) and passes the dialed number for connection to the internet via the local gateway.

TruPhone Anywhere works in many countries including most of Europe, North America, and some Asian countries. For the full list, consult Truphone’s website.

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A Look at the Top Aggregation Services

Jason Harris — Sat, 31 May 2008 19:00:27 +0000

If your company or co-workers are involved in numerous web 2.0 sites, you may have images on Flickr, videos on YouTube, a blog with an RSS feed and so on. This results in giving your website users many places to look when they consume your organization’s online media – not very user friendly.

This content separation leaves a space that aggregation services are trying to fill. Sites such as FriendFeed (covered before), Tumblr, and the new Strands.com (covered by parent site GigaOm.com) are all vying for your attention. These aggregation websites create what are called activity streams or life streams, and combine all your online media into one place (and one RSS Feed) for your intended audience. You have complete control as to which sites are combined and aggregated in the services.

Tumblr

Tumblr was the among the first aggregation services and allows you to create a tumble-log. Basically a tumble-log is a variation on a traditional blog that is allows you to publish many different types of media to it. Tumblr wants you to put your photos, videos, blog entries, message boards onto their service, no matter where these media items exist.

Tumblr tumble-logs feature an RSS feed, giving users easy access to stay up to date on all the items you include in your tumble-log.

FriendFeed

FriendFeed is the current web 2.0 darling site with lots of usage among bloggers. To get started, head over to their homepage and complete the sign-up process. Adding your services is as easy as giving your various account names for that service or simply the RSS feed. For example, to add your Flickr photostream into FriendFeed, just supply FriendFeed your Flickr username. The web service will handle the rest.

FriendFeed recently announced the inclusion of “Rooms.” With this feature, you can create a room based on an interest, event, company name, or whichever topic you chose. A company or group might want to create a room for their business or topic area to give users a way to particpate in creating an online home for their area of interest.

Strands.com

Strands.com, from the social music recommendation service company Strands, takes FriendFeed and adds on a layer. Strands.com tries to improve upon FriendFeed by offering the aggregation functionality, but giving you suggestion as to what content will be of interest to you based the way you consume social media. Strands.com knows your online contacts are fantastic filters for online content, and will use them to show you items you may find interesting.

For example, if you have a co-worker who is an expert in a particular field of interest, add them to your Strands.com contacts and when they recommend a video, online article, or other media item, you’ll be alerted through your Strands.com webpage.

As you can see, there are many sites that give you the ability to bridge your online assets into one functional website.

How do you keep people connected to your various online media items? Does aggregation interest you?

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The New Work From Home Trend: Getting Out?

Jason Harris — Fri, 30 May 2008 13:00:03 +0000

Back when broadband Internet access was made available to homes in the late 1990′s, teleworking took off. In businesses, employees were allowed to work from home part time (in some cases, full time) and many home based businesses took off, allowing small time entrepreneurs to have a low-cost launching point for their great idea.

Then, reality set in. Working from your home can be isolating and can result in feeling cut off from the working world. Co-working is a new trend, as recently reported by CNN and others, which involves teleworkers gathering within the same physical space in order to have some social time while working on their tasks. There are businesses such as CubeSpace and Citizen Space that make co-working easy by offering space for co-workers to gather, however what is a web worker to do if they don’t have this type of option close by?

Do It Yourself

Most teleworkers likely know someone who also works remotely from their office. If you feel comfortable doing this, offer to host a co-working session at your house or other meeting space. Much in the same way moms self-organize play dates, teleworkers will gain benefit by gathering to work together on an occasional basis. In exchange for offering up your Wi-Fi connection and a making a few pots of coffee, you’ll be able to exchange ideas and make some potentially profitable business connections. For example, by gathering with other bloggers or programmers, I often gain story ideas and other opportunities I would otherwise not come across.

Break Out Of Your Shell

If you see the same people routinely at your Starbucks, engage with them in a conversation to see if they’d like to make it a regular meeting time. This might be a great way to meet teleworkers who don’t necessarily work in your field. Additionally, by meeting at a Starbucks or your local pub, you can use the hosting business’ Wi-Fi and avoid the effort of hosting a co-working session at your house.

Tools to Aid You

To organize a group of co-working professionals, you can either:

Start a website: build a web site to serve as the communication hub.
Initiate a Google Group: Drop dead easy way to centralize communications, however everyone will need a Google Account
Simply start an email mailing list
Check out the Co-Working wiki page as it has many valuable resources.

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Pinch Media Offers Metrics for iPhone Developers

Jason Harris — Thu, 29 May 2008 20:00:06 +0000

Just as any online content producer or web site owner is hungry for metrics about their web site, iPhone application developers are bound to want the same types of facts and figures surrounding the usage of their programs. New York City-based startup Pinch Media, which has received an undisclosed amount of funding from Union Square Ventures, First Round Capital and a handful of angel investors, offers iPhone SDK developers free code that gives them analytics based on unique users, active users and length of time the application is in use.

Not only has Apple has sold roughly 5.4 million iPhones to date, but it’s working hard to get the device into as many people’s hands as possible, launching it in country after country around the globe. At this point, it’s hard to gauge how large this market could become.

And with the iPhone SDK coming out in June at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference, we’re about to see an explosion of apps being offered by mobile developers. Indeed, as the iPhone ecosystem continues to evolve, startups that offer tools such as Pinch Analytics are going to be really valuable.

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