I used to use Fring on my mobile phone, to attach to my Skype account. That way I had a choice. If I wanted to phone anyone from my mobile, I could either do it the conventional way just using 3 Mobile, or I could use Skypeout - which was free, as I had a Skype subscription. This worked fine using mobile internet (1GB of data is also included in my 3 mobile phone contract), and worked perfectly if I was attached to Wifi, which I am at home, and didn't even use up mobile data.
However, Fring and Skype had a bust-up, and you can't reach your Skype account from Fring any more. You have to use the Mobile Skype application, which has 2 limitations. 1) you can't use Skypeout (they want you to use your 3 Mobile included minutes instead), and 2) it only works over mobile internet, not Wifi. The first of these basically means it's useless.
I tried the Fring alternative, Nimbuzz, but didn't really get on with it; and besides, it didn't get on with my phone either.
So instead I started investigating SIP VoIP. You'll have heard of Vonage - that's SIP, albeit a tied and expensive way of getting SIP. A lot of mobile phones have a built-in SIP client, but mine doesn't. However, Fring is also a software SIP client, so that would do. I had a look at providers, and chose and registered an account with CallWithUs as my SIP provider.
So now I have VoIP calls from my mobile again.
Next step: software SIP clients are available for the PC. This allows you to use the same account to make calls from the PC as well. Not that useful, but just experimenting with the technology at that stage.
So at this point, I am back to being able to make VoIP calls from my mobile phone, and from my PCs, via SIP, just as I used to with Skype.
But there's more! You can buy little gateway adapters that sit in between your landline telephone and your broadband router, that will route "normal" calls over SIP instead of over BT or whichever provider you use. So I bought one of those. One of these, actually.
Configurable to use BT or SIP dependent on things I set up. For instance, it's always cheaper to phone mobiles over SIP than over BT, so the box always sends calls to mobiles over SIP. It's cheaper to phone landlines that way too, except when you're in your "free evenings and weekends" periods. So with a bit of trickery, it can route via BT when it's free, and over SIP at other times. Of course, 0800, 999, 1471 and similar always want to go via BT, so that's configurable too. International calls are so much cheaper over SIP than BT, not that I make that many.
You can make more than one call through the same SIP account simultaneously, so I can use it on Fring on my mobile even when N is at home phoning her mum in the middle of the afternoon - which BT used to charge loads for, and that's really the reason I went as far with this as I have!
One side-effect - the VoIP calls don't appear on your BT bill, of course, or your 3 bill. They appear against your SIP account, which you only get to see online when you log on to their website, to top up, or whatever. So it's actually also a way of hiding calls, if you have a reason to do that. No use to me though, that.
Sunday, 25 July 2010
Fundamental
It's absurd to go through all that, through all this, I suppose, and still have positive feelings for someone. I still feel warmth toward her, I'm still fond of her, still hope she's happy. Something fundamental is going on. It doesn't have to make any sense. That's just love, isn't it?
Queen's Flickr account!
Sounds quite improbable, doesn't it? But there's some good stuff in there!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/britishmonarchy/sets/72157624099279897/with/4678450995/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/britishmonarchy/sets/72157624099279897/with/4678450995/
Monday, 19 July 2010
Sunday, 18 July 2010
Old, old
I stumbled across this on YouTube. Sound quality is a bit ropey, but it's a rarity, a real treasure.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=advhefzPFWc
This was 1991, so YOTC was 15 years old by then.
But 1991 itself is almost 20 years ago now! Which is longer!! My god!
I have a strange sense of timeshock. I do feel rather disorientated in time.
"The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there." So wrote L. P. Hartley, who, incidentally, was born in Whittlesey, not a million miles from where we grew up. He has a good point; however, you can at least travel to foreign countries. Even emigrate to them. The past is irreconcilably out of bounds.
It's not a "born too late to see Josephine Baker" feeling. It's just the strangeness: that things were - equally valid things - and are no more. People were, artefacts were, and are no more. Victorian contradictions, part traditionalist, part hurtling headlong into the unknown; Fin de siècle feelings of passing and loss, and of hope and optimism; Edwardian golden age, for some anyway; all these Zeitgeists, and many, many more, come and gone. Meaning what?
I was looking the other day at some old photos someone had posted on FB, of where I worked in the late 80s. Lots of people I remember. With massive 80s hair, awful clothes and so on. Ridiculously trivial example, of course, but at least tangible to everyone my age, and it clearly demonstrates that it happens well within the span of a lifetime.
This is of course why I love Al. He deals with time so well! I thought I was going to end this piece with Katherine of Oregon, retiring into memories: albums of photographs spread on the floor again.
But no, not yet. For now, it's House of Clocks. Clocks that sang in ringing chimes, To take the measure of the times, Clocks that spoke in wordless rhymes, So long, so long , so long.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=advhefzPFWc
This was 1991, so YOTC was 15 years old by then.
But 1991 itself is almost 20 years ago now! Which is longer!! My god!
I have a strange sense of timeshock. I do feel rather disorientated in time.
"The past is a foreign country. They do things differently there." So wrote L. P. Hartley, who, incidentally, was born in Whittlesey, not a million miles from where we grew up. He has a good point; however, you can at least travel to foreign countries. Even emigrate to them. The past is irreconcilably out of bounds.
It's not a "born too late to see Josephine Baker" feeling. It's just the strangeness: that things were - equally valid things - and are no more. People were, artefacts were, and are no more. Victorian contradictions, part traditionalist, part hurtling headlong into the unknown; Fin de siècle feelings of passing and loss, and of hope and optimism; Edwardian golden age, for some anyway; all these Zeitgeists, and many, many more, come and gone. Meaning what?
I was looking the other day at some old photos someone had posted on FB, of where I worked in the late 80s. Lots of people I remember. With massive 80s hair, awful clothes and so on. Ridiculously trivial example, of course, but at least tangible to everyone my age, and it clearly demonstrates that it happens well within the span of a lifetime.
This is of course why I love Al. He deals with time so well! I thought I was going to end this piece with Katherine of Oregon, retiring into memories: albums of photographs spread on the floor again.
But no, not yet. For now, it's House of Clocks. Clocks that sang in ringing chimes, To take the measure of the times, Clocks that spoke in wordless rhymes, So long, so long , so long.
Thursday, 15 July 2010
Triolet for J
I much regret that I have lost you twice,
But more that you were never mine at all.
To suffer one rejection wasn’t nice.
I much regret that I have lost you twice.
And if two tragedies would not suffice,
I finally saw the writing on the wall:
I much regret that I have lost you twice –
But more – that you were never mine at all.
IJC, 19/11/04
But more that you were never mine at all.
To suffer one rejection wasn’t nice.
I much regret that I have lost you twice.
And if two tragedies would not suffice,
I finally saw the writing on the wall:
I much regret that I have lost you twice –
But more – that you were never mine at all.
IJC, 19/11/04
Pad, Pad
I always remember your beautiful flowers
And the beautiful kimono you wore
When you sat on the couch
With that tigerish crouch
And told me you loved me no more.
What I cannot remember is how I felt when you were unkind
All I know is, if you were unkind now I should not mind.
Ah me, the power to feel exaggerated, angry and sad
The years have taken from me. Softly I go now, pad pad.
-- Stevie Smith
And the beautiful kimono you wore
When you sat on the couch
With that tigerish crouch
And told me you loved me no more.
What I cannot remember is how I felt when you were unkind
All I know is, if you were unkind now I should not mind.
Ah me, the power to feel exaggerated, angry and sad
The years have taken from me. Softly I go now, pad pad.
-- Stevie Smith
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
