Russell Shaw recently wrote about a list of features that people have requested of Vonage. The specific list of features is not that important; instead what is remarkable are two other things: first that users are asking a service provider, second, that the service provider is slow in meeting these demands.
We have been told for so long that the intelligence has moved to the end. If that is so, then why are the users asking the service providers for new features? Shouldn’t they be asking the end-device manufacturers? Oh wait. I forgot that the devices have been sufficiently lobotomized that any feature however basic can be realized only with the help of the service provider.
The other thing we are told often is that one of the biggest benefits of SIP is that features can be developed in a jiffy (the often repeated phrase in the halls of the building that once housed bellheads was that in the new world “features can be developed in the garage by the undergraduates”). What is more, the features can be deployed in a distributed manner. But still most of the requests remain unfulfilled. Is there anyway to blame the bellheads for this state of affairs?
Shouldn’t our reaction be something similar to the anchorman in the movie Network?
Posted by aswath at May 20, 2005 09:41 AM