[娱乐时尚] 电话的末日

The end of the phone as we know it

Andy Jagoe is zigging while the rest of the mobile world zags. Let everyone else chase the next hot iPhone app. He’s betting the next big thing is a twist on the same old thing: making calls.

He may be right. Jagoe, CEO and co-founder of startup 3jam, is one of several Silicon Valley dreamers who thinks he can reinvent the phone call. And really, let’s admit it’s in need of some Internet-style innovation. We’re in 2009, for crying out loud. Why isn’t call forwarding as easy as e-mail forwarding? Why don’t your voicemails live in a nifty little online inbox?

Remember web 2.0? It’s time for phone 2.0.

And it’s arriving. The most prominent example is Google's (GOOG) Google Voice, an invitation-only service that offers a free Internet telephone number that forwards calls wherever its owner chooses and delivers features like visual voicemail, call screening and transcription.

Mountain View-based Ditech Networks (DITC) has a similar invitation-only offering called toktok. San Francisco-based 3jam, which is open to the public and starts at $5 per month, adds tricks like convenient group text messaging.

Voice apps are coming

Not everyone is a fan. Apple (AAPL) caused a stir last month when it barred Google Voice software from the iPhone App Store, saying it duplicates features the handset already provides. But Jagoe thinks the services will prevail eventually. “It's going to be hard,” he says, “to prevent this kind of functionality from appearing on a phone.”

Indeed, people who use these services swear by them, and in Silicon Valley these days it’s a growing cohort. (At a mobile technology panel this month at Microsoft’s (MSFT) Mountain View campus, Google Voice users outnumbered Amazon (AMZN) Kindle users five to one.) The reason is simple: phone 2.0 is liberating phone calls the same way webmail liberated e-mail a decade ago. Now you can keep your phone number, your call history and your voicemails no matter how many times you move, change jobs or switch carriers.

Over a burger at a San Francisco lunch spot, Jagoe explains why this revolution in phone calls is happening now. First, it recently became more affordable for startups like 3jam to forward calls to landlines. Second, Neustar (NSR), a company that enables text messaging, this year gave Internet-based phone numbers a boost by allowing them to send and receive text messages. And third, mobile consumers increasingly crave better options for managing their conversations and staying productive.

Of course, even if the masses are ready for a phone call revolution, there’s no guarantee they’ll buy it from 3jam. If Google Voice opens up its free service to the general public soon, it will get a lot tougher for Jagoe to sell monthly plans. And then there’s the threat from the phone giants: Glenn Lurie, president of Emerging Devices at AT&T (T), tells Fortune that he’s keeping an eye on Internet-based voice services. Clearly carriers would prefer to be the ones selling those kinds of features.

Regardless, Jagoe has a couple of things going for him. 3jam recently finalized a deal with Peek, maker of the eponymous e-mail device, where 3jam will offer phone numbers to Peek users. With those numbers, users soon will be able to more reliably send texts as well as e-mails, and even get voicemail transcripts.

Perhaps more important, Jagoe is running a lean operation, having recently cut 3jam’s full-time payroll from 25 people to 5. He says the company is on track to be cash flow positive by the end of the year, which should help him to avoid the fate of VoIP peers like Yoomba and Jangl that burned through cash before they could figure out a long-term business model.

In the end, the business part has to work. Even in the phone 2.0 world, if you can’t pay the bills, you get disconnected.

整个手机行业在向左走，而安迪•贾戈尔（Andy Jagoe）则往右行。让别人去追逐下一个热门的iPhone应用吧。贾戈尔正在下注下一件大事是老一套翻出新花样：打电话。

他可能是对的。贾戈尔是新创企业3jam的联合创始人兼首席执行官，同另外几位硅谷梦想家一样，他也相信自己能彻底改造电话呼叫行业。确实，我们必须承认电话呼叫需要一些网络方式的创新。别忘了，我们可是身在2009年。呼叫转移为何不像邮件转发那么容易？语音邮件为何没放在一个小巧的在线收件箱里？

还记得web 2.0吗？现在应该推出phone 2.0了。

Phone 2.0正在到来。最突出的例子是谷歌（Google）的Google Voice，这是一种需要邀请的服务，能提供免费的网络电话号码，可将呼叫转移到被呼叫者选择的任何地方，并具备可视语音邮件、呼叫筛选和转录等功能。

位于山景城的Ditech Networks有一款名为toktok、需要邀请的类似产品。位于旧金山的3jam——对公众开放，起价为每月5美元——增加了便捷群发短信等功能。

语音应用即将登场

并非所有人都欢迎这一改变。苹果公司（Apple）在上个月阻止Google Voice软件进入iPhone App Store，称该软件复制了手机已经提供的功能，此事引发骚动。不过，贾戈尔认为这项服务终将流行。他说道：“要阻止这类功能出现在手机上将很难。”

确实，使用这些服务的人对其十分信赖，眼下在硅谷，这样的人正越来越多。（本月，在微软（Microsoft）的山景园区，在一个移动技术专门小组上，Google Voice的使用者与亚马逊（Amazon）Kindle的使用者的比例为5：1。）原因很简单：phone 2.0正将电话呼叫解放出来，正如十年前网页邮件解放电子邮件一样。现在，不论你搬多少次家、换多少份工作、换多少家运营商，你都能保留自己的电话号码、呼叫记录以及语音邮件。

在旧金山某家午餐馆吃汉堡包时，贾戈尔解释了电话呼叫革命为何现在发生。首先，将呼叫转移到固定电话的成本近来有所下降，像3jam这样的新创企业比较负担得起。其次，Neustar——一家提供短信功能的公司——今年允许基于网络的电话号码收发短信，此举促进了此类号码的发展。再次，手机用户越来越渴望管理其谈话并保持效率的更好办法。

当然，即便大众已经准备好迎接电话呼叫革命，也无法保证他们将从3jam购买服务。假如Google Voice马上向公众公开其免费服务，贾戈尔再想销售包月计划难度将大得多。此外还有来自电话业巨头的威胁。美国电话电报公司（AT&T）新兴设备主管格伦•卢里（Glenn Lurie）向《财富》表示，他正在关注基于网络的语音服务。显然，运营商们更希望由自己来销售此类功能。

不论如何，贾戈尔也算有些收获。3jam最近敲定了与Peek——同名电子邮件设备制造商——的一笔交易，3jam将向Peek用户提供电话号码。有了这些号码，用户很快将能够更可靠的发送电子邮件和短信，甚至能获得语音邮件副本。

或许更重要的是，贾戈尔在轻装上阵，他最近将3jam的全职员工人数从25人减少至5人。贾戈尔表示预计到今年底该公司的现金流就将为正，这将有助于他避免重蹈Yoomba和Jangl等VoIP同行的覆辙，后者还没来得及找到长期的商业模式，就把钱全花光了。

最后，商业部分必须产生效果。即便在phone 2.0的世界里，假如你付不起账单，服务还是会中止。