My friend Andy Abramson just yesterday posted “Staying Connected- Beating The High Cost of Roaming http://ow.ly/18lHO6“.  I wanted to bring any attention I could to his article because it highlights one of my favorite companies, Truphone.  I’ve been an advocate of theirs for many years now have enjoyed their service for as long as it’s been around.  If you are into saving serious money when traveling abroad whether it’s in the US or outside the US I suggest reading Andy’s article and giving Truphone a try.

Just to be clear

I have been a user of GrandCentral for a few years now and I’ve always been happy with the service.  It has always been adequate for me to use as my business number but it has always lacked a few features.  Well As of 2 days ago GrandCentral has been transformed and renamed Google Voice. Most importantly to me they have added SMS support.  Now I can receive SMS on my work number and have it forwarded to my mobile or email.  This is fantastic and the best part of all of this is that it’s still FREE.  Yes you heard me some companies charge big bucks for this kind of thing but Google is Google and they aren’t charging anything for the service.  If you want to make international calls there is a fee but for incoming it is fantastic.

Andy Abramson goes into more detail on his blog.  Thanks GC and GV, “One number for life”!

Last Thursday I had a meeting that got pushed back an hour so I thought who’s close by, well Ken Rutkowski only lives a few blocks away so I thought I’d text him.  He calls me right back after he gets my text and says, “Aren’t you coming to San Diego for GadgetFest today?”.  That’s how my day went from standard to the other end of the spectrum in 1 minute.  I had to rearrange the rest of my day, grab some clothes for the event and get down there, but before that I still had to wait for my meeting.  Anyways, I get to the Qualcomm campus and so starts GadgetFest.

I saw some amazing new battlefield medical technology and played with the newest and unreleased Nokia, Motorola, and LG handsets in the tent outside.  After some appetizers and a beer it was time to go inside for the main event.  There were 7 companies in a competition with 4 judges and the audience to vote for the winner.  I didn’t get the names of all the companies but the winner is a friend of mine, Tom Carter from Truphone.  Their new service is still under embargo so I can’t write about it here…

I will give you a hint, “It” works on a very popular business centric set of handsets.

All the companies submissions were interesting but far and away Truphone was the best and LG had the best presenter.

After the presentation and awards there was a wine reception followed by a VIP dinner that I was graciously invited to, thanks Ken.

I met more high power execs in one night then I do in most months.  It was a pleasure to meet Rory Moore the president of CommNexus and Michael Robertson the founder of MP3.com and Gizmo (the VOIP and SMS giant).  I met many more people but I’m mobile as I’m writing this and don’t have their business

That’s all for now, I have to run.  More news about Truphone on Monday.

I was in San Jose airport last week waiting to fly home and was told there was free wifi.  I had a few hours to kill and I went to the Bits & Bytes bar, plopped down ordered a Tuna sandwich and a beer expecting to spend a few hours working.  Well, low and behold, don’t fall over anybody, the wifi in the airport was terrible.  I was able to connect on and off for about 30 min, then it went totally dark.  Of course it was in the middle of a Skype chat with Andy Abramson who was in the next terminal over and we were trying to coordinate meeting up.  Well, that never happened and I blame it on the crappy wifi.  I’m learning more and more that free public wifi in airports can’t even be counted on to check email and IM with friends.  I wasn’t expecting to make a video call, but I didn’t think retrieving my email should be so taxing on the airports wifi infrastructure.

Anyways, that’s another airport that gets a big fat zero in my book.

TripIt is good but!!! I can’t seem to export my flight details (like flight #rs and times) into iCal on my MacBook.  I love that all these great details are on line but I want to be able to see them in the calendar of the Nokia E71 I’m using without having to go online.  I might be stuck in an airport where I’m roaming on my mobile network or underground on a train or even on the flight and I want to check to see the number of my next flight.  I signed up for TripIt when I learned about it back in February at MWC in Barcelona but haven’t used it since.  I am now testing it and really like it’s online presence but I’m disappointed in it’s ability to sync with my calendar.  Please contact me if I’m mistaken, maybe I can’t find the right settings.  It would also be nice if there was some sort of integration with Dopplr, another web app.  I will say though that I’m happy to see that they have an m. site for the mobile web.

A friend of mine Andy Abramson has been signing it’s praise on KenRadio and because of that I will continue to play with it but I don’t see much potential if it doesn’t do what I need it to do most, make my life easier by syncing properly and in turn saving me time of having to do the data entry myself.

EDIT:

After being contacted by the lovely Kristin from TripIt just minutes after this post went live I found out I was mistaken.  For some reason beyond me, the default settings on my account were a miss and I am now able to automatically add my flight info to my iCal calendar.  All you have to do is go from your main page to “Account” and then to “Feeds” and select “Yes” for including your details under your personal calendar feed.

Kristin, thanks for making me an instant convert to your service for 2 reasons

1. It now saves me time and that’s worth paying for

2. Your customer service is second to none

Andy, thanks for reminding me about TripIt and Kristin thanks for helping with my settings.

My friend Andy Abramson mentioned on his blog VoIP Watch today that there are rumors a new Skype phone may be coming out. I have been intrigued with the Skype phone for as long as I’ve known about it and have wanted one for just as long. This phone is special in that you would think it’s a Wifi phone but it is really a regular GSM device. It passes the voice call through a gateway which passes the call off to Skype. So it is a real PSTN call. I keep thinking it would make a great work phone for me. The question is why isn’t AT&T or T-Mobile coming out with it. Is it even on their horizon? I highly doubt it but can continue to hope. Now Skype how about a deal with my buddy Pat Phelan from MAXRoam? That would be a truly international phone then. Skype contact me for an introduction…

I don’t want to get into a whole other subject of why we still have roaming fees right now. MAXRoam and Truphone are helping me with that subject.

Would any of my US or readers from other countries buy a Skype phone similar to Hutchensen 3s if you had the chance? By the way, the plans are AWSOME for this phone on 3.

I want to thank Comunicano and Nokia for including me in all kinds of great briefings and meals last week at CTIA in Las Vegas. My friend Andy Abramson the owner of the most prominent mobile PR firm was most gracious and hospitable by brining me along to participate. Andy had a great team along with him in the way of Michelle and Danielle from Comunicano and Ray (James Caans long lost twin) from Nokia was a fantastic liaison.

I am very excited to see what is coming down the pipeline from Nokia. A few of the most exciting to me are the N810 WiMax edition (I really like the plain old N810 I got to try out) and Ovi including a huge event promoted on Ovi called Pangea Day.

Thanks again Andy, Ray, and Nokia.

I have been anti social-networks for a long time, until my friend Mike convinced me I had to join LinkedIn. I was hoping that would be the only network I joined but then I was convinced I needed to join Facebook so I could get the word out about Unlimited Drinks in Israel. At this point I am promising myself that I will not join another social network. Low and behold I was just asked to join another, called Spock (I haven’t joined yet). LinkedIn has actually been useful in business.

Andy Abramson writes,

They are HUGE time suckers. They are not bad if you have time to spare but I don’t.

One of the best Personal networking types I know, James Body of client Truphone pinged me yesterday on Skype about a reading something on pal and client Alec Saunders’ personal blog about getting an email about Spock, a network I am deeming as Anti-Social and did so the first time I received an invite. Alec received the same reply a few other friends who I know, really know better, have received from me and posted it anonymously on his blog. Body of course had heard or read my views on just how many networks we really need and how many networks we need not join and why from me firsthand on a recent London visit.

Unless every other way we have to communicate has broken, I am not joining another Social Network. Sorry. All these do is generate more and more email.

Now Irwin Lazar of Nemeretes is singing the same tune I am making, me wonder if I should have blogged about what I already have said on Ken Radio’s World Technology Roundup, made reference about at Mobile Monday Madrid or shared with trusted friends in private e-mail. It seems Alec’s second post on the subject confirms my gut reaction.

Do we really need more networks, or do we need to get more from the ones we already have? As Plaxo looks more like LinkedIn, and as LinkedIn tries to keep up with the Facebooks, the whole idea of social networks, to get closer, not farther from people has really started to wane, and we may be seeing something more necessary the OPT ME OUT NOW option that would prevent the impersonal “join my network” emails that are doing nothing but creating the equal of Internet “in box pollution.” In affect the value of the “network” which is really at the core of all these is being burned at the altar by a “get big fast” VC fueled management style these networks all have in common.

Here’s a hint. It’s not how many, it’s who..that matters. Just like blogs. You don’t have to have the biggest audience. It’s whom is in the audience that does, questioning once again if Size Matters.

Exercising your own network, and networking not adding is the muscle these tools bring to establishing relationships. But if all the Social Networks are going to become, then we really will have nothing but a growing list of White Pages competitors……and Yellow Pages wannabees.

I tend to agree with Andy, I am going to work on the networks I am connected to now. Social networks are ok but I don’t personally have the time to spend even another minute working on another profile.