Bloggers miss the point of the v-phone

Posts: 1424

Hey Bloggers!

Perhaps you should take a break from reporting on Vonage until you can be objective. It's obvious some of you were burned by the IPO. How about researching the products and reporting on them based on their own merits instead of just dissin' everything that comes out of Holmdel?

Russel Shaw wrote:

When you nsert the V-Phone into your desktop or notebook, that activates the Vonage software on your machine.

I am not certain here if Mr. Shaw wrote unclearly or thought unclearly. The software from the adapter runs on the machine, and it doesn't have to be your machine. This is not a minor point, it is in fact very significant.

Russell Shaw wrote:

Sure, you might want to return calls placed to your Vonage number, but you can go in to the Vonage dashboard from the Vonage website, pull those numbers down, and then call them from your cell, no?

Uh, Vonage is about doing things less expensively. If I can sit down at a public terminal and make my phone calls for free, why would I use a cell phone. Perhaps you have forgotten that in the real world many people have to pay their own cell phone bills? So, this product isn't for people who have megaminute cell phone plans. If Vonage can provide near the same level of convenience at extremely lower cost levels then only a dot-com reject would continue to use the cell phone.

Tom Keating wrote:

Does this PC have a microphone or headset? Unlike the Mplat, I don't believe the V-Phone has a builit-in mic, but I'll have to confirm that.

Perhaps you should research the product before you write about it?

Tom Keating wrote:

Why a user wouldn't simply download and use the Vonage softphone client instead of paying $40 is beyond me. Although, you have to pay $9.99/month for 500 softphone minutes, but you do get the added benefit of gaining access to your SIP credentials for use in other SIP devices.

OK, you want to know why? I will tell you why!

You don't have to have your computer with you! Sometimes I travel without my computer, more and more often I find that I am not allowed to connect my computer to a customer's network.
Some people can get away with using this as their primary phone with unlimited minutes. The $40 cost will be recovered quickly if you have a high enough call volume.
$40 is not much more than the cost of a USB memory stick. If you don't have one now you should probably go out and get one, they are actually very useful.

OK, I am not saying that this is the greatest product ever. But it certainly does have its place in the Vonage stable. For young mobile professionals trying to save money on phone bills Vonage has provided a solution that is easy-to-use, portable and low-cost.

This criticism that it isn't unique is bogus. What makes this device unique is that it is coupled with Vonage service. That means that you get most of the benefits of Vonage service with this stick.

Posts: 13 · Vonage Forum Associate Joined: Jun 21, 2006 Posts: 13

As someone who has used one I'd say it's nothing more than audio usb adapter merged with a memory stick.

my only question is why it comes up as a CD drive...

Posts: 497 · Vonage Forum Evangelist Joined: Apr 29, 2005 Posts: 497

pennystock wrote:

my only question is why it comes up as a CD drive...

Maybe it comes up as a CD drive so that it can AutoPlay...just a thought

Posts: 1715 · Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 12:49 pm Post subject:

Usually I agree with Scerruti, but in this case, I disagree.

While it'd be nice to have Vonage as a "portable" device, public computers aren't all that common in the USA. Internet cafes are a rare find in most of the USA, short of NYC, SF, etc. I'd agree the situation is a bit different in Europe where there are a lot more internet cafes and you're dealing with a walking population vs. driving. Not sure when the last time you were in an internet cafe was, but most of the ones I've seen in recent years run a linux distro on the terminals. No spyware worries, and they don't have to worry about people loading crap software (Gator/AIM/Kazaa) on them. The few places which had WinXP/2k boxes had them locked down so that new apps couldn't be loaded/run on them.

I don't have a problem with the $40 price ('though the 256MB pen drives go for $10 anymore), but I don't like the idea of having to get a separate full-fledged Vonage account for this. I would have liked to seen it similar to the cell providers "add-a-line" plans. It also wouldn't have hurt to be able to receive incoming calls from my main line on it as well. I'm sure there are some people who will grab this asap, but I think it could have been something better.

As far as not being allowed to connect to foreign networks, I actually have more of a problem with people connecting USB pen drives to computers. I can easily keep track of what people do (without being oppressive) with TCP/IP. Keeping an eye on individual PCs is a PITA and tends to generate negative vibes from the employees.

See this article on a USB drive attack on a credit union:
http://enterprisesecurity.symantec.com/content.cfm?articleid=6715
more details on it here:
http://www.darkreading.com/document.asp?doc_id=95556&WT.svl=column1_1

I'm a bit more forward-thinking on my network designs, but I always include plenty of public access ethernet ports (isolated from the corporate network) for visiting clients/contractors with the thought that people are going to do it even if I ask them not to. Smile

Of course, the next question is how long will it be before someone hacks/cracks it? Not that extracting SIP credentials from a TCP/IP stream requires any skill anymore..

Posts: 1424 · Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:05 pm Post subject:

Your network is ahead of the game from most of my customers. Of course most of them only closed their open wireless access points in the last year.

I agree with you that allowing employees to use USB drives is a nightmare, I was familiar with the credit union story, but once again, most of the places I am dealing with don't have any types of controls on the individual computers.

I was concerned in some respects about access through firewalls, but not as concerned about Internet cafes. Since the vast majority of all computers out there are Windows I imagine you could find something.

I think the product is OK, and certainly not for everyone, but it has a place. Especially for people who need an unlimited, transportable Vonage line.