[Ti] Net2Phone

[Dr. Trevor J. Hutley]

At 15:25 -0500 23/12/03, Seymour J. Wolfson wrote:
>>>Does one exist ?
>>>Does anyone have experience with OS X software 
>>>for making phone calls over the net?
>>
>>Try this: 
>><http://www.nikotel.com/software.htm>  I 
>>haven't tried this; let me know what you think.
>============================
>I have tried that, but you have to set up an 
>account with them.  I could never get an account 
>setup.  It always rejected my credit card. They 
>wanted me to FAX them a copy of my card, which I 
>will not do. If you get it to work, let me know.

Seymour - THANKS ! this Nikotel software looks 
pretty good. Actually, the Nikotel https site was 
one that Safari seemed to handle OK, which is 
almost a first.

Their procedure is that they will now POST an 
activation code to my credit card billing address 
in Switzerland ..., so that wastes at least a 
week.  A bit annoying, as I was hoping to use 
this software over the holidays.

The onlt thing that is pretty negative about 
their software is that it uses the Address Book 
(very well integrated) BUT it does not want the 
leading zeroes on the phone numbers, which of 
course you need in the address book, if you 
normally use the numbers with a (BlueTooth) 
mobile phone, as I do.

I will write to them about that.  I just cannot 
get my head round the thinking that went in to 
that part of the software concept.

I will let you know if I get credit card 
approval.  May even call you VOIP to tell 
you......

If this technology works, at ¢5/min, plus about 
¢1.5/min for the dial-up charge, it is about 1/10 
the price of a regular phone call from here to CH.

This could be one of the most impressive demos of 
the power of a Mac, to handle this 
telecom/computer integration.

It continues to surprise me that APPLE has not 
vigorously pursued this technology.  They have 
played around with it for about a decade.  I 
remember when I had a Hypercard stack that I 
made, with all my customer contact details on 
(primitive address book) with a Phone icon on 
each card that could cause the audio sound of 
tone dialling.  I used to pick up my phone in the 
office, tilt the handset towards the IIfx Mac, 
click on the phone icon on the card, and the 
number was dialled out.  Then digital lines came, 
and my experiments died.

There is IMHO a huge potential for Apple to make 
a big impact in this converging technology, 
especially as they now have this Digital 
Lifestyle theme.  What better (perhaps after 
Music) than this as a demo?

regards from Trevor on Christmas day already in Saudi Arabia