Archive for April 2009
Three cheers for facebook. They fixed the Phanfare newsfeed issue.
When facebook rolled out their twitterization, they inadvertently broke our ability to post photos from phanfare to facebook. After the rollout, the photos would go to a facebook’s user’s profile, but not generate a news story.
Without a news story, pushing the photos was like a tree falling in the wilderness. Does it make a sound? It doesn’t matter. Nobody would know if it did or didn’t.
I was pretty sad when facebook broke our transfer process. We had worked for weeks to create a great experience for Phanfare users to transfer select photos to facebook on demand, and we had invested that time hoping that facebook would keep the whole thing working.
I wondered whether facebook broke our integration (and others like it) by accident due to indifference or deliberate decision. It is fair to say that since the facebook application platform has launched about a year ago, facebook has gradually restricted apps more and more and backed away from that platform as it failed to help them monetize facebook and became a bit spammy.
So I was happy to see that they fixed the bugs in the newsfeed. Photos transferred from phanfare to facebook once again show up in the newsfeed of your facebook friends. Kudos to facebook to staying committed to being an open platform and investing their time and energy in supporting developers.
Why the wireless carriers won't permit Skype to work over 3G
I am in France this week vacationing with family. I tried the new Skype app to make phone calls back to the US from my iPhone. Works very well. The Skype app is restricted to WiFi only. Want to know why? Just do the math.
I pay $30/month in the US for my unlimited data plan, and use about 160 megabytes per month. That comes out to $0.19/megabyte. Meanwhile, I also have a voice plan. My wife and I use a family plan. We have 2100 minutes and last month used 992 of those minutes, for which we paid $100. Assuming that a voice call over GSM uses approximately 10 kilobits/second, that is $1.34/megabyte we are paying to use the voice network, more than 7x as much.
ATT would rather sell access to their voice network at $1.34/megabyte versus their data network at $0.19/megabyte. And that is why the wireless carriers will not allow skype to use their data network. They don’t want to move people from voice to data.
If you look at SMS text and international rates, the situation only becomes more glaring. ATT charges $1.19/minute to make a voice call back to the US from France. That comes out to $15.87/megabyte. At that rate, I waited and made calls over skype using Wifi.
Text is even worse. Last month I had a 200 msg text plan for $5. That works out to $178/megabyte, assuming no breakage and full 140 character messages. But, I only used 47 of my messages, so I paid $759/megabyte. Ouch.
Of course, the wireless carriers won’t be able to continue getting so much more for their voice, text and international voice services compared to their data services. All are essentially the same service and over the long run, we will wind up paying the lower price of $0.19/megabyte. Nature finds a way. Just like I found a way to use Skype to make phone calls from France versus pay $15.87/megabyte to make a roaming international calls, so will everybody else. Because data is data.
Buy photographic prints from your iPhone using Phanfare Photon
Just returning from CTIA in Las Vegas where we announced that you can now buy prints from within Phanfare Photon using an iPhone or iPod touch. The update is available in the Apple App store now.
We offer a full range of photographic print sizes, printed on matte or glossy paper. There is a shopping cart built right into the app so you can checkout on the phone. Of, you can start the order on the phone and finish it on the web.
Phanfare is the first company to offer prints-by-mail from the iPhone. You are not limited to buying prints of photos taken from the iPhone. Since Phanfare Photon syncs all your photos to your phone, can buy prints of any image you like. We use the fullsize image to make the print.
Phanfare premium customers enjoy better pricing. For Premium customers, 4×6 prints are $.08. You can see our full price list here..
To make the process easier, you can use addresses out of your iPhone contacts and the credit card you have on file with Phanfare, if you have previously given us one either for a merchandise order or for premium membership.
Let us know in the comments what you think of the new printing features.
An Engineer 