Technology, Books and Other Neat Stuff

Skype 2.0 has just gone into Beta.

It's added video. Is web cam driven video calling over VOIP going to finally be the killer app the video phone folk have been looking for? After all, the folks at Creative are launching a Skype-branded web camera to go along with the Motorola Skype headsets...

Certainly Skype has the mythical multiplier of the network effect on its side as it begins work on popularising video and voice over IP (shall we take a stab at calling it VVOIP?). As I type this there are just under 4 million people connected to the Skype network. All they need is a cheap web cam and a software upgrade, and that's 4 million VVOIP users ready to burn the bandwidth. That's a lot easier to do than when BT, and most recently Alan Sugar, tried to launch video phone services over the POTS network.

Now to get the Gizmo Project folks to add video to their SIP system. Will that give us video blogging for LJ, along with the Gizmo-driven voice blogging service announced earlier this week?

The ever hilarious Verity Stob has a new regular home - The Register.

"It's a great honour to be working full time for The Reg," says Ms Stob. "I've always wanted to contribute to a really down-to-the-metal, ultra-technical website. One that never holds back the details of in circuit voltages, or of template template parameters in particularly obscure bits of C++. I can't wait to get started."

Good for them. We need more people to take the piss out of Visual Basic.

And for all you Doctor Who fans out there, here's her triumphant return: "Candid Dalek Shares Thesp Tidbits".