Turns out, what I needed ironically was Dupee’s app called MobileDay. MobileDay, which is available for Android and iOS, offers a way to run all of your conference calls through one mobile app, allowing you to dial-in with almost no work. So instead of manually dialing into different conferencing systems and tapping out passcodes that sometimes hit a ridiculous 10 digits, MobileDay just alerts me to upcoming calls and then connects me with a couple of taps.

MobileDay works by scanning your calendar for conference call invites. It then matches those invites to the thousands of conferencing systems and their dial-in numbers in its database. When it comes time for your call, it notifies a user with a push notification. I just click to get into the app and then choose to join the call with one tap. MobileDay remembers all the dial-in information and enters it for me.

Last week, MobileDay added support for the Apple iPad, Skype audio and VoIP calls via Talkatone. It’s not just for audio calls. MobileDay can also connect users into Facetime Wi-Fi calls, Google+ Hangouts and into GoToMeeting and WebEx via native applications.

MobileDay also works well for people hosting conference calls. It recognizes when a user sets up a call and only requires them to enter in their host dial-in information once. Users can also message meeting attendees via email or text easily or send canned messages about running late. There’s also one button to rejoin a dropped call.

MobileDay feels like it could be a great addition to a mobile operating system. I would love to see this automatically turned on so I don’t have to scramble for dial-in information. Conference calling is still a headache for me, even when I get it on my calendar.

But Dupee sees an opportunity for MobileDay to be more than just an OS feature. He said MobileDay can offer premium services to companies and users who want to connect the app to other services like Salesforce. There’s also a big opportunity to be deployed by enterprise customers, who can use MobileDay to save on conference calling expenses. Oftentimes, employees will dial into conference calls using an 800 number but they could be using a local number or Wi-Fi which is cheaper, something MobileDay could arrange automatically. MobileDay is talking to two big companies right now about different possible enterprise deployments. And it’s still mulling whether it wants to launch its own conferencing services rather than aggregating others.

Dupee didn’t set out to build another conferencing startup. He previously sold his company Copper Conferencing and then moved on to become VP of channel sales at Intercall, another online conferencing company. When he started with his next venture in Boulder, CO, the goal was to build a calendaring app called Skedul.me. He raised $1.5 million a year ago from Google Ventures, Foundry Group, Softbank, SoftTech VC, Box Group and DH Capital. But he and co-founder and CEO Jim Haid realized that the bigger opportunity was in going back to the conferencing market, only this time from a very mobile perspective.

“I had done conferencing for 12 years and I didn’t want to that again,” said Dupee. “But when we started to move to conferencing, it became clear there was an opportunity because of our knowledge of the space and the fact that no one’s innovating. And I was very intrigued by mobile. Regardless of what app I made, I knew I was going to do mobile.”

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Video conferencing still isn’t taking off.

Someone at Apple truly believes in it and that’s a good sign as I think it can be the future one day. At around 11:30AM on the morning of Apple’s iPhone announcement, Steve Jobs made the first public FaceTime call with his friend Jony Ive:

Jobs: You know this amazing. I grew up with “The Jetsons” and “Star Trek,” dreaming about stuff like this, and here it is.

Ive: I grew up the same way. And it’s real now isn’t it?

Yes it is, but will people use it? Was video conferencing only going to take off if introduced in the 70s? Has society moved past video conferencing? I’ll say that FaceTime has zero chance of succeeding if Apple chooses to limit the technology to Apple devices. Apple’s strategy in 2003 with the release of iChat AV was to make it work with all AIM users as long as those users were using the latest version of AIM with a USB webcam, and ideally it’ll open up FaceTime technology to other phones as well.

[inline-ad]Opening FaceTime up is key and let’s hope that more companies jump in and adopt the technology so all of us can chat without barriers, communicate and interact face to face on any device. John Gruber posted this last week which threw a wrench in my FaceTime predictions where he notes Apple states that it will ship tens of millions of FaceTime devices in 2010 and he then goes on to predict that Apple could position FaceTime to completely eliminate the current carrier model of paying for minutes where all voice and video data are transmitted over HTTP via a simple data plan. An iPad with 3G could be a FaceTime device for one data price and still offer instant communications with anyone in the world.

Now we’re talking!

Of course, we still must tackle this hurdle of our social habits showing a completely different story when it comes to voice and video communications. Mobile minutes are down. Data use is up. Socially, at least in the U.S., we simply don’t talk on the phone as much as we did. Kids are texting, adults are IMing and the in-betweens are using e-mail and Twitter. My only phone conversation a week is reserved to a chat with my Mom and Dad who live at the other end of the country or with my girlfriend when I’m traveling. In those two instances, FaceTime would be perfect.

A point that I want to make that was said perfectly in Gizmodo’s FaceTime testing notes is:

Because what are you supposed to be looking at? What should you be showing? You’re used to talking on a phone and pacing around, skimming an email, doing something else at the same time. But with this, you can’t. You just hold your phone out in front of you, awkwardly, and look at the other person looking back at you, also awkwardly. And you wonder, why are we doing this?

So really, FaceTime is great if you actually have something you want to show someone, like a new outfit or your new house or your kid. But if you’re just calling to shoot the breeze? It’s…awkward.

The same can be said for iChat AV via iSight or Skype. The same can be said via video calling built into Nokia and other smartphones overseas and the same can be said for how our children in their teens use phones for texting instead of calling each other. There’s something you could be doing while on the phone or there’s simply an awkwardness about dedicating all of you in full vivid retina display quality to someone to communicate something that could be better done via voice or even text. It’s the truth.

Of course, I don’t think it’s a bad thing if FaceTime goes global and, in 2010, millions of devices from computers to tablet PCs to mobile phones ship with FaceTime enabled. If everyone walks around staring at each other in screens actually having real conversations instead of doing a million things at once, that will be a wonderful thing. You’ll be able to add, “saved humanity” to Apple’s achievements right alongside with largest music store and use of most adjectives in a single keynote.

I think any product that becomes cool and also something that forces us to stop and actually have a conversation nearly face-to-face will be good for the world and good for Apple. I just hope it’s not too late, but if a puppet can bring smiles to someone over FaceTime, maybe there’s hope.

HiDef Conferencing is an audio conferencing service where participants can call into a voice conference via Skype, designated landline numbers or toll free numbers. Its name derives from its support of HD Voice – a feature inherent to Skype that results in crystal clear voice quality superior to our experience with standard phones or mobile phones.

Through web-based controls hosts can schedule calls, send out invitations and, during the call, manage who is speaking, monitor hand raising and record the conversation. Should the speaker be accessing the call via Skype, all others who are listening via Skype will benefit from the HD Voice feature. Landline and wireless participants are limited to the audio quality of the underlying phone service.

Yesterday HiDef Conferencing, recognizing that businesses will be looking for ways to save on not only communications costs but also travel costs in these economically challenging times, announced that they will not charge subscription fees for the balance of 2008 while new subscribers can trial their service with no monthly subscription charge.

Accessing a call via Skype is free for unlimited minutes while accessing via a country-specific phone numbers will result in any long distance charges to that phone number.

Pat Phelan has made considerable use of HiDef Conferencing and was delighted to receive an email where this offer was extended to their current customers. Tom Evslin became an HD Voice fan when his Vonage service failed him.

Here is an ideal opportunity to see if audio conferencing solutions are viable for your business.

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Palbee homepage

In the fight for dominance in the video web conferencing realm, we have WebEx, the granddaddy who struggles to stay one step ahead of the young fighters such as GoToMeeting. But into the ring leaps Palbee, a scrappy upstart based out of Seoul, Korea who can throw a quick and unexpected left hook that could knock the socks off the competition.

Palbee is leaner than the big guys. And it is cheaper. Much cheaper. While still in beta, it is completely free. Sure, it doesn’t have all of the bells and whistles of the heavy hitters, however, what it lacks in bulk, it makes up for in simplicity. Palbee sought out to be easier to use, and it succeeds.

Set up a free account, log into Palbee, type the title of your meeting, hit start. Voila. You can get a little more complex – but not much more – by opting to record the meeting (click a button), invite other users to your meeting (click a button, type in their Palbee names), and schedule your meeting for another date and time (click a button, enter date and time).

Other quick specs:

• You can have up to 10 people in each meeting.
• There is a limit on meeting time – 1 hour.
• Palbee currently supports JPEGs, GIFs and PowerPoint files.
• Cross platform – runs with a Web browser and Flash.

Palbee Meeting

Now Hear This

Palbee delivers the one two punch with these features:

1. Their whiteboard feature - Every participant can gain access to markup tools including drawing and text functions to make notes on the image or PowerPoint file as it appears on everyone’s desktop. Currently, you have to take a screenshot to save those notations, but brainstorming and collaboration is easy to do.

2. Their conference room embed feature – While I’m not quite sure of the work application here, I was intrigued by the ability to lift some embed code of a Palbee meeting space and paste it into your Web site, blog or even MySpace page. This means that people can click on the Palbee widget and enter the same meeting room. Yes, this also means that if you paste the widget on multiple sites, those become multiple points of entry into the same conference room. So your visitors can engage not only in a live video web conference call or chat with you but also with one another at any time. Freaky!

In the Works

Some of the handy features that will be in a future version of Palbee include:

1. A premium level of services.
2. The ability to save the whiteboard edits.
3. Inviting conferencing guests who are not already registered users of Palbee (registration is free).

Palbee Widget

The company says that Palbee was not initially designed to fit a market need – it was created to fit an internal company need and then they realized it could serve a much wider market.

When I did the demo with the company as part of researching this post, the camera feature did not work for me. The software was not recognizing my Webcam built into my MacBook. There was also the expected delay – I was in Alaska and they were in Seoul, Korea!

If you like Beta products and don’t mind working out the kinks along with the company, Palbee is a handy little tool to meet your next basic Web conferencing needs.

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This Friday Apple will be releasing the 2.1 software update for iPhone users.

This update will be completely free for iPhone users and, according to Jobs, will fix address a lot of issues such as dropped calls, crashes, and painfully slow sync times. Along with the fixes will also be better battery life.

The 2.1 update for iPod touch users is actually available today, though it seems most users have had mixed results actually getting the update to work through iTunes. If you’re feeling antsy, you can try downloading the update package directly here, though your results may vary on actually getting it to work. I downloaded the update via that link and the update installed correctly but throws an “Unknown error occurred” message, though data still seems to sync correctly. So, you’ve been warned. :)

The 2.1 update is free for iPod touch users who purchased the 2.0 update but will cost $10 to those who are upgrading from 1.x.

Let me know if you have any issues with either update.

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I recently reviewed Rondee, the easy-as-pie phone conferencing site, but just heard about a new conferencing site worth mentioning to expand your options for free conference calls.

Calliflower provides services to cover the entire process of conference calls – from setting them up to holding them to the followup and continued dialogue after the call is over. Calliflower is all about “building conversations” and sharing media, and they do it through a relatively clean dashboard so all of the elements of your call are on one screen.

Calliflower actually began as a FaceBook application adding free audio conferencing capabilities to people’s FaceBook accounts. As the app grew in popularity, the demand for the services apart from FaceBook became increasingly apparent to the company’s founders. They expanded their solution for not just conference calls but kept an eye toward being a solution for holding teleseminars and teleclasses as well.

To showcase their site’s capabilities, the company is offering their Calliflower Communiques, regular tele-conversations between a host (life enhancement speaker and writer Allan Hunkin) and authors and celebrities ranging from Alan Alda to William Shatner presented as teleseminars.

Here are some of the aspects of Calliflower worth noting:

1. Pin-free access to calls. After registering a call participant’s phone number becomes their personal pin. Easy to remember. Those who don’t want to register can access calls with a pin sent to them when the call is set up.

2. Controls at your fingertips. You can mute and unmute participants; acknowledge raised hands (a little hand icon that participants can use to signal they have something to say); lower hands; and other moderator functions. Everything is visible on a handy dashboard, a single Web -page view of your controls.

3. Multiple ways of accessing calls. Participants can opt to use VoiP (Truphone) or even a “call my phone” service (Sitofono) which is especially popular in Europe were mobile phone calls are free when received but incur a fee when made.

4. Enhancing call with a chat wall. You can carry out a simultaneous text chat as well as drop in links to MP3 files, flicker URLs to embed photos, share slides, and other multimedia resources to supplement the call and allow others to follow along.

5. “Seeing” the callers. You can see the names, pictures and caller status of everyone participating in the call – all on the dashboard. You can also see if their mike is open or closed or if their hand is raised.

6. Accessible call archives. You can archive the call agenda, any handouts, links and files to be accessed anytime after a call has been completed. This can also include an MP3 recording of the call.

Calliflower is looking to “reinvent business conversations” and provide new ways for people to interact within a conference call. Looks like they are on their way.

Some other conferencing call sites and services we’ve covered recently include FreeConference.com, SightSpeed (video conferencing), and Yugma.

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The DVDs look like regular ole shiny discs, but once exposed to oxygen, a special glue on the disc darkens and within 48 hours, the DVD is unreadable. Perfect to take on the plane, supposedly. The dead disc can then be recycled, for free. But it’s more likely to get tossed into the garbage, which is what has environmental groups up in arms.

I have to side with the tree-huggers on this one. With a little planning before your trip, you can take your Netflix DVDs along with you and return them from anywhere in the U.S. Better yet, just download a copy of whatever you want to watch — no fuss, no muss, and no landfill mess.

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As useful as high definition audio is for person-to-person calls, it would be great to have this type of option for conference calls as well.  Vapps provides this type of service, called high-definition conferencing, to Skype.  In the Tools menu of the Windows version of Skype, there’s a Do-More button that launches the Vapps-powered conferencing solution.  Within this interface, you can start an instant meeting or schedule one in the future.  Meeting attendees are notified either by a Skype IM message or an email. Meetings can consist of up to 500 attendees.

While using Vapps, meeting facilitators can see who joins and leaves the meeting, mute and unmute participants, and record the conference as well.  The Skype Do More menu is available in English, Mandarin Chinese, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Polish, and Spanish.  This conferencing service, with its use of pure VoIP, is popular with international teams who need to conduct conference calls.

Why does Vapps sound so much better than a traditional phone call?  It’s all about wideband connectivity.  That is, a normal copper phone wire transmission only uses about a third of the fidelity the human ear can hear.  High definition conferencing uses 16KHz and you can definitely hear the difference as audio quality is theoretically 4-times better using this metric.

For Skype conference calling, Vapps Service is free.  Packages begin at $25/month and go up to $75/month.  It is possible to have a mix of landlines and Skype participants, where traditional phone users will call in via a toll-free phone number or local number.  For more information, check out Vapps’ website.

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Mark Day Joins YouTube; bald-headed comedian moves from the yellow wall to manage the video sharing site’s comedy channel. (YouTube Blog)

WGA to its Members: Easy, Tigers; while rumors swirl of the guild and producers reaching an agreement, the WGA reminds is members that they are still on strike and there is no contract yet. (Broadcasting and Cable)

Network Foundation Technologies Enabling “Micro-Casts”; company’s streaming technology allows very small companies to create and target niche video ads. (MediaWeek)

Democrats Tap Level 3; CDN chosen to carry live video and content delivery for the 2008 Democratic National Convention. (release)

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Tonight I get another one of those awesome chances as I’ll be dining with mobile tech maven Michael Connick. He’s in the area for work so we’re taking the opportunity to meet up, eat a good meal and talk mobile tech. What’s interesting to me is that Michael and I are among the few end users that are happy with Vista on our mobile devices. I have the beta of SP-1 for Vista on my Q1P and so far, I don’t see much impact for better or worse. I’ve been just fine with Vista on this device for months and I wouldn’t go back to XP if you paid me. Michael seems quite happy with Vista on his 600 MHz Kohjinsha SH6 (you can see a video of his device’s performance here) so while our dinner could have turned into a Vista vs. XP conversation, I suspect we’ll instead share our positive experiences. I tend to agree with James that a "lighter" version of Windows would serve mobile devices well, but as I’ve said before, I think Windows is too many solutions to too many customers and businesses for a whole new take on the OS. Needless to say, if Michael brings his Kohji, it will be interesting to compare the performances of our two main mobile devices.

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