Interesting. I had not noticed this before. Photobooth effects are available in Skype profile settings.

New Mac beta available for Skype (iPhone version has an update as well). Grab the desktop Skype update here.

• Skype for Mac 6 months no update
• Cool Skype widget for WordPress

The WSJ is reporting that Skype is finally being released for the iPhone. Check the AppStore Tuesday for the official release. Personally this is the most wanted app on my phone. I’m hoping it will work with backgrounder.

• Does the iPhone suck?
• Skype for Mac 6 months no update

When the iPhone was first announced I, like everyone else, wanted one. I took my own advice by holding off on getting a first generation device and waited for the prices to come down and for potential bugs to be ironed out. Now that I’ve had 2 weeks with the iPhone 3G I wanted to share some thoughts on Apple’s most amazing and desired gadget.

The iPhone is a conversation starter. The multi touch UI is easy on the eyes and pleasant to use. The build quality is top notch. Having a phone + GPS + iPod is pretty cool. The OS while a bit sluggish for a phone is stable. The ability to install apps right from the appstore is well done and the app ecosystem is a game changer for the software industry.

However, as a smartphone – the iPhone sucks. Apple has taken what is potentially the coolest gadget ever made and then crippled it just about every way they could. I’m trying to imagine just how bad the iPhone would suck if it was not Jailbroken – which mine is. I’m an Apple fan. I like their software, hardware and the thought that goes into their products. The frustrating thing about the iPhone is just how cool it could be.

List of things that make iPhone suck.

NO Bluetooth

What modern phone, let alone SmartPhone, does not allow for basic bluetooth pairing and file transfer? I’ve become accustomed to writing all of my SMS through an app on my Macbook dashboard and then sending them off with an easy Control+S via bluetooth to my cheap ass Nokia ‘dumb phone’. I can also browse the file system of the Nokia 3310c from the Macbook or send notes to it as easily as right clicking on them and choosing to send them to the phone. The fact that I can’t do this on the most advanced (supposedly) and most expensive phone I’ve ever purchased does not sit right with me.

NO WiFi Sync

My iPhone has WiFi, so does my Macbook. Why then do I have to carry around a cable to sync circa 1999?

NO Document support

Out here in the real world we use PDF and Word Docs as a format to exchange files. I guess in Cupertino they use post-its? My macbook can read these formats natively without additional software – why can’t my iPhone?

NO File Manager

And no search for that matter. Some of us actually store and retrieve real file from our PDAs. Sometimes we even search for them when we forgot where we left them. We like to search our contacts as well. I think they need to bottle the water in Cupertino as they have super human memory over there.

NO Flash

What the hell? Flash video.. Games? Maps?

NO Video

OK, I can use Cycorder if i want to go face jailtime but the fact that this feature is left out is a JOKE. Seriously. I would’ve loved to have been a fly on the wall at Apple at that meeting. “I know, lets really fuck them up and put a camera there but get this, they can’t record video!” WTF?

NO Skype

Skype on the iPhone would be awesome. It seems like Skype is running on everything except the iPhone. I don’t really care if the blame for this one falls at the doorstep of Apple or AT&T – it just sucks. Fix it.

At the end of the day the iPhone feels like a Disney theme park ride. Have your fun as long as you stay securely in your seat and on the rails. Even though your car on the roller coaster looks like a spaceship, it’s really a fiberglass car on steel rails.

Some might say, “Don’t worry though, all of these features will be provided by the hacker community and eventually filter their way into an official update or app at some point in the future.” I’d rather have these smart folks working on a cure for cancer or the next generation alternative fuel source than figuring out how to reverse engineer the bluetooth stack on my silly iPhone. But that’s how it goes.

However much I am bitching about the iPhone – I’ll hang on to it for another month or so to see if the next child genius has figured out a way for me to hack my phone so that it compares to my throw away Nokia.

So here is my advice, don’t buy an iPhone. Wait until Apple pulls their head from their ass and realizes we’re grown up enough to handle features that have been on even the most basic of phones for the last half decade..

It’s still pretty cool to see my four year old playing with Zephyr.

• Skype mobile for non WiFi JAVA phones
• Pystar lawyers accuse Apple of anticompetitive tactics

It’s been a while since Skype has released a significant update for OSX. Seems like a very long time between updates for such a product. Maybe the Mac team is hard at work on an iPhone version?

• Photobooth effects for Skype avatars
• Skype for iPhone

Apparently you can run real Skype mobile on non wifi and even on Nokia 40 Series 3G / EDGE mobiles like Motorola, Samsung and Sony Ericsson JAVA phones now.

Some of the models I see supported include older yet still very popular Nokia 5300, 5310 and E series. Many more models on the supported list.

Go see if your phone works now.

I am guessing that more models are supported than the official Skype list lets on. Jan (thanks for the heads up Jan) messaged me with a Nokia E70 even though that’s not in the list.

JAVA Skype – cool!

Update – Works on my very vanilla Nokia 3110c . I chose Nokia 5300 from the download list.

• Does the iPhone suck?
• Photobooth effects for Skype avatars

I’m just wondering if development on Skype for OSX has shut down. It’s been about a year since the last update. What’s up with that? Maybe Skype 4 by 2009?

• Photobooth effects for Skype avatars
• Skype for Mac 6 months no update

A founding member of Skype, Toivo Annus, (orange shirt above) has a new startup developing video calling applications and user interfaces for flat-screen TV-s. In other words, Toivo is going to bring video conferencing and VoIP to your next LCD TV. I found this nugget over at Jan’s blog.

Investment group Ambient Sound Investments’ (ASI) project is named InkSpin1 which includes creating Skype user interface for LCD TV sets. So that the video calls can be hold on large TV screen.

type (toivo) in skype chat

• Google implements Marratech video conferencing in Gmail
• Cool Skype widget for WordPress

photo by Martyn Starkey

I just noticed over on Jerry Ong’s blog that Ping.FM has updated their service to support friendster, Yahoo 360, Delicious. Great to see more social networks added.

I’m still hoping for Skype status updates.

• Cool Skype widget for WordPress
• Cross posting redux: pingPressFM

image by jonrawlinson

I’ve just heard from Ashod at MeBeam that he’s released personal MeBeam server. According to Ashod this is “full backend mebeam is now running on – single exe, no installs, 760k file.”

MeBeam is opening its network to the public, with a vast array of back end services, including dedicated servers, private networks, and co-location services.

Some of our more exotic services will include, flash to SIP telephony, 3G video gateways, Web to Polycom transcoding, and of course, high end video conferencing.

This is a bold and smart move. I’m excited to see how this performs on an intranet. Attention universities, law enforcement, medical technologists, this is one the most promising multipoint video conferencing platforms I have seen. Windows only for now.

• Icondial, Call any phone in the World
• YouTube HQ video by default

Lots of options, well done.

Define all your default Skype Status settings here. Start simply by setting the basics like Skype ID, Full Name and the button Theme you want to show on your blog. Then activate the Skype Status Widget on your Widgets page or use the Skype Status quicktag button Skype Online Status in the WYSIWYG editor (TinyMCE) to place the Skype Online Status button in any post or page. Later on, you can fine-tune everything until it fits just perfectly on you pages.

Grab Skype Online Status here.

• MyBlogLog plugin working with WordPress
• Panties not found