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Nokia Provides Good Link to Email
November 2, 2004  
By Susan Kuchinskas

Good Technology announced a deal with wireless handset manufacturer Nokia (Quote, Chart) to extend GoodLink to Nokia's Communicators and enterprise-oriented smartphones.

Santa Clara, Calif.-based Good's GoodLink is a software/service offering for wireless messaging and data access. It includes access to Microsoft Exchange-based e-mail, contacts, calendar, notes and tasks, as well as to applications for customer relationship management (define), enterprise resource planning (define) and supply chain management.

The companies will work together to engineer GoodLink for Nokia's Communicator line of mini keyboard devices, as well as others using the Symbian platform.

"This agreement for the Symbian platform puts GoodLink support on the three major wireless platforms," said Sue Forbes, vice president of marketing for Good.

Good competes aggressively with Research in Motion, purveyor of the Blackberry mobile devices and messaging services. Both companies use the same stratagem of locating a wireless messaging gateway inside the corporate firewall; both sell messaging services separate from connectivity but often go to market with wireless network operators.

In 2003, Good partnered with Microsoft to integrate GoodLink with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and its ActiveSync environment. Soon after, it brought on board Handspring (now owned by PalmOne (Quote, Chart)) and Cingular to offer GoodLink on the Treo mobile device line, which uses the Palm operating system.

In 2004, Good deepened the Microsoft relationship by providing access to Windows applications via GoodLink. Of course, Microsoft offers mobile access through its own Exchange Server 2003.

"Microsoft does have some synchronization capabilities," Forbes said, "but they're limited only to Exchange 2003 implementations, and it does not have the capabilities that GoodLink does in security and management."

The industry giants are getting wise to the fact that Research in Motion is starting to play in their backyards," Forbes said. "They're often seen as the leader in the marketplace, with a vertically integrated proprietary system. We believe that as the marketplace grows, it transitions to a more industry-standard approach. Now we see that actually happening."

In fact, the software is the least part of the corporate wireless messaging system, said Creative Strategies analyst Tim Bajarin. "The fact is, there are a lot of solutions out there. Form and function are the biggest issues. You have to be comfortable with the device, be able to read the screen well. Also, you've got to have very good coverage."

For example, Bajarin said that palmOne's Treo line has become the hot-selling corporate mobile device. Treo 650 users can choose e-mail services not only from Good, but also from Seven Networks, Visto Mobile, Intellisync, OneBridge and Notify. They also can access their employer's Exchange Server 2003 directly, thanks to a deal between palmOne and Microsoft that provides access through VersaMail.

Gartner analyst Ken Dulaney said that most enterprises wont be tempted by wireless e-mail offerings from the carriers.

"Carriers develop offerings but are not regarded seriously by enterprises," he said. "They have weak support staff and sales people who don't know who to talk to or support the enterprise. The carrier options will find few opportunities in the enterprise. They are not respected nor do they understand how to gain favor."

At the same time, enterprise users are increasingly demanding devices that provide both wireless e-mail and telephony, according to Dulaney. "Every wireless e-mail device must have voice," he said.

Meanwhile, Dulaney will not count RIM out. Nor will Bajarin.

"I still think Blackberry and RIM have a strong position," Bajarin said. "They'll stay competitive."

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
R G V  N E W S L E T T E R


NOVEMBER 2004

Welcome to the Rockbridge Global Village, Inc. Newsletter. We have selectively found information and articles that may be of interest to our customers.  We hope that you find information and topics within this newsletter interesting and useful.

Topics in this newsletter:

Post Election Tech Issues Await Congress
Nokia Provides Good Link to Email
Will AOL Become a Has-Been?
Getting Started: Setting Up Shop Online

Post Election Tech Issues Await Congress
November 3, 2004  By Roy Mark

Major technology policy issues were left on the backburner of Congress in the run up to Tuesday's hotly contested general elections.

With the winners in the U.S. House and Senate races (mostly) decided, including the results for President Bush, the presumptive re-election winner while Ohio counts provisional ballots, could their technology agenda heat up again?

A roundup of some of the top issues that await the upcoming lame duck session and the next Congress:

Voice Over IP

Although technology failed to raise a note in the elections, several critical IT issues are awaiting immediate attention in Washington and none more so than the regulatory status of Voice over IP (define).

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) plans to rule Nov. 9 on whether Internet telephony is an interstate service and exempt from state and local regulation and tariffs.

The FCC is currently reviewing the regulatory status of VoIP. The agency is anxious to keep the issue out of the courts, but, in the absence of congressional action, the FCC is racing against the docket clock. On Nov. 17, oral arguments are expected to get under way in Minnesota's appeal of a decision ruling the Internet telephone service offered by Vonage an interstate information service and not subject to Minnesota laws regarding traditional telephone carriers.

In its year-long VoIP review process, the FCC has already exempted Jeff Pulver's Free World Dialup (FWP) from state regulations because the free calls customers make are routed entirely over the Internet and never interconnect with the public switched telephone network. With a broadband connection, FWD members talk with each other computer-to-computer.

In a preliminary ruling issued in August, the FCC also said Internet telephony should be subject to traditional wiretap laws. The preliminary decision will force VoIP providers to comply with the same law enforcement rules as telephone carriers.

The FCC is also considering VoIP carrier obligations in regards to emergency 911 calling services and any contributions the VoIP industry should make to the Universal Service Fund.

Taxing the Connections?

In the lame duck Congress returning to Washington on Nov. 16, legislation is still pending on reviving the expired Internet access tax moratorium and spyware.

The House and the Senate both agree the moratorium that expired a year ago exempting Internet connections from taxes should be extended. They sharply disagree over the duration of the next moratorium and grandfather exclusions for states already taxing Internet access.

In September of 2003, before the moratorium expired, the House voted to permanently extend the ban on connection taxes. The bill also requires nine states that were grandfathered in the original 1998 legislation to repeal existing Internet access taxes on dial-up or DSL high-speed connections.

A similar proposal stalled in the Senate. In April, the Senate voted 93-3 to extend the moratorium for another four years. The bill also keeps the grandfather provisions of the original moratorium.

The solidarity of the final Senate vote masked the deep divisions criss-crossing through party lines over Internet access taxation. Throughout the three-day floor debate, more than a third of the Senate consistently voted to shorten the duration of a new moratorium and to keep the access definitions much narrower in scope.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimates that repealing the grandfather clause will result in revenue losses for the states totaling between $80 million and $120 million annually.

Dueling Anti-Spyware Legislation

The House and the Senate disagree over the need for national anti-spyware legislation. Last month, the House passed two bills in three days aimed at thwarting so-called driveby downloads.

The Internet Spyware Prevention Act of 2004 (H.R. 4661), which passed on a 415-0 vote, makes it a crime to intentionally access a computer without authorization or to intentionally exceed authorized access. If the unauthorized intrusion is to further another federal crime such as secretly accessing personal data, the penalty is up to five years in prison.

Deliberately injuring or defrauding a person or damaging a computer through the unauthorized installation of spyware carries prison terms of up to two years. The legislation also authorizes $10 million for the Department of Justice to combat spyware and phishing (define) scams, although the bill does not specifically make phishing a crime.

Another bill, the Spy Act (H.R. 2929), prohibits unfair or deceptive practices related to spyware. The legislation requires an opt-in notice and consent form for legal software that collects personally identifiable information from consumers. The penalties in H.R. 2929 are limited to civil fines of up to $3 million.

Getting Started: Setting Up Shop Online
October 25, 2004
By Kevin Reichard

Despite all the advances in the e-commerce industry over the last five or so years, one thing has remained the same: It's still a challenging task to set up your own e-commerce site if you're a small business and don't want to hire someone else to put it together. Plus, there are very few out-of-the-box solutions for the SMB looking to implement e-commerce.

So what's a SMB owner to do without investing a lot (well, thousands, anyway)?

One approach is working with your Internet service provider on the basics of an e-commerce site. Virtually every large and medium-sized ISP offers e-commerce capabilities of some sort, whether it be selling a special e-commerce package or offering e-commerce tools as part of a larger package.

The advantage to working with an ISP on e-commerce issue is convenience: You don't need to totally overhaul your server setup while adding the capability to take orders online. There are some additional cost benefits: Instead of having to invest in e-commerce software (like Miva Merchant), you can piggyback off the investment already made by your ISP.

Give Me Three Steps
So exactly what are you looking at with an e-commerce account at an ISP? You're looking at three separate areas of functionality: an online catalog for displaying products, merchant software that allows visitors to order products and a merchant account for processing credit cards.

Most ISPs offer merchant software that allows you to directly sell products, but few go to the next stage and offer the capability to process credit cards directly through the ISP. (Many have partners who they recommend.) You can expect to pay as little as $19.95 per month or as much as $99.95 per month for an e-commerce account, as well as transaction fees.

An ISP also typically doesn't provide all the tools needed to perform an e-commerce transaction from beginning to end. (There are some exceptions; we'll get to them.) Most mainstream ISPs will offer the merchant software and perhaps catalog software (and many merchant-account packages do include catalog capabilities), but it will be up to you to find a vendor offering merchant accounts for processing credit cards.

It will be also up to you to acquire an Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) certificate, which ensures a secure transaction for your customers. (Neither of these are a biggie: Chances are good your bank already offers some sort of merchant account for online vendors, and an SSL certificate can be acquired easily from the likes of Verisign.) Merchant accounts range from PayPal, which simplifies the process to a single button placed on your Website, to accounts from larger banks that will probably require a small amount of coding.

Once you acquire all the pieces, you'll need to put them together. This isn't as big a deal as it sounds, but you should expect to tinker with processes to get everything operating correctly for your business. The best way to understand the process is to visualize the online shopping experience:

  • A visitor sees that snazzy item on your Web site catalog and wants to buy it.
  • She places the item in a cart; when she's done shopping, she checks out and orders the product, with the system estimating any applicable sales taxes and shipping charges.
  • Credit-card information is passed along to a online bank, which then clears the transaction.

So your process is the following:

  • Setting up a catalog, which can reside on your existing server or be part of a separate online catalog.
  • Software like Miva Merchant or Yahoo Merchant tracks a user's cart and prepares the transaction.
  • The merchant banker seals the deal by processing the credit-card transaction.

Facing the Limitations
There are several disadvantages, however. Unless you're working with an ISP that specializes in e-commerce, you probably can't expect a lot of help when it comes to the specifics of actual implementation — you can expect some short instructions on where to find the server and some longer documents on configuration, but that's about it. Also, most ISPs are not staffed to the point where they can offer a lot of personalized assistance.

Some do offer more hands-on consulting, but you'll want to watch your costs as well. Interland, one of the top ISPs on the market, advertises ECommerceExpress, a custom $39.95/month e-commerce site (with a $599.95 setup fee) with one limitation: You can have only 25 items in your online catalog. The next level of account — $69.95 per month with a $1,499.95 setup fee — features an online catalog limited to 100 items.

For a less-customized e-commerce site, the Yahoo's Merchant Solutions offers catalog capabilities, transaction processing and less-restrictive limitations on the number of items in a catalog for $39.95 per month. However, Yahoo! does charge a 1.5 percent tranactions fee on all sales.

Setting up an e-commerce Web site is never as simple as it seems: Just because a process can be reduced to three steps doesn't mean it's easy to implement, and making the pieces fit can sometimes be a frustrating thing. But using the e-commerce tools available from your ISP can be one way to translate sweat equity into a profitable venture for your business.

Rockbridge Global Village, Inc.
312 S. Main Street
Lexington, VA 24450
540-463-4451
www.rockbridge.net

 


Copyright © 2003. Rockbridge Global Village, Inc. All rights reserved.
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AOL
 


Will AOL Become a Has-Been?
November 2, 2004
By K Dowdie

Seven hundred employees is a lot to cut -- especially all at once. But that's what AOL is doing again this year (last year's cuts were worse), signaling once again that the world's largest ISP is caught in a tailspin it may find difficult to reverse. As impressive as the company's efforts have been to reinvigorate its technology and position itself as more of a content provider, AOL just hasn't been able to ride the broadband revolution. In fact, it's being slowly killed by it. Thousands of people every day are ditching their dialup accounts for broadband access, and in most cases, it doesn't make sense to go with AOL broadband -- unless you really care about AOL's content. Frankly, I don't, but I'm not much of a media guy anyway, so that's not a fair test. One problem lurking behind the mass defections might be that inexperienced, non-computer-savvy users perceive AOL's service as being "slow," when in fact they are just having bad memories of dialup connections in the days long ago when AOL was scrambling to add enough service centers to keep up with its exploding dialup business. Bet they wish they had that problem now. AOL seems to be suffering from a spending problem, an image problem, and a possible identity crisis. But there is still hope, I think. Somebody needs to come in at the highest levels and perform the Lee Iacocca treatment. But what do I know?