Talk with your iPod Touch

If, like me, you're an iPod Touch owner you may find yourself suffering from iPhone Envy. That is the feeling of mild irritation that you can't make phone calls. However, there are a couple of applications for the Touch that allow you to use it as a phone. Both apps require WiFi and both are free, although you will need to shell out for microphone.

Skype
The daddy of Internet phone calls comes to the iPod. If you're an existing Skype user then you can sign in after having installed the app, import your contacts and away you go. The usual services are on offer, that is free Skype-To-Skype calls plus chargeable calls to other networks.

Truphone
Launched in 2008, Truphone started off as a service dedicated to the iPod Touch and iPhone. However, it has since extended to Blackberrys, Nokia and G1 phones. Basically it offers that same service as Truphone although you can make free calls to Skype users in addition to Truphone.

Delboydare and I both have an iPod Touch. Del's is the 16gig. Mine is the 32gig. We found that Skype was better in that it worked. Derek's Truphone kept dropping out every time he got pop ups about his battery and it took a number of times for us to establish a connection and on a couple of occasion only one of us could hear the other. We were testing both apps using our own wireless networks in our respective homes. If they were that flaky under those circumstances, how they would perform using a network in a busy coffee shop?

A common irritant is that you can't have concurrent applications open. This means that I can't use any other app in case the phone rings. I've heard of hanging on the telephone but this is ridiculous.

Both services offer a range of packages to subscribe to for landline and mobile while offering free calls within their own network users. On the surface, this seems like an excellent way of getting over iPhone Envy. And relative cheaply as well. What's missing of course is 3G. Neither service allows for it which is just as well because the iPod Touch doesn't have it. However, it does mean that you're constrained by the presence of WiFi in your location. As more free hotspots become available this may alleviate the problem and you could always subscribe to a paid for WiFi service such as The Cloud. However, at present mobile WiFi phone calling could probably be compared with telephone boxes, in that you can only make calls in specific locations (although WiFi hotpsots don't usually get vandalised).

Having said that, there are ways of hooking yourself up to WiFi without having to pay extra or restrict your movements to visiting coffee chains and Wetherspoons pubs. We plan to post a guide to finding free hotspots and mobile phone 3G tethering later in the week.

In summary, voice call using WiFi has a way to go but it's early days and we look forward to seeing what its like in the future. We'd definitely like to see an app developed so they could run in the background so we can still play Galaxy On Fire while waiting for a call.

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Social Media MA

Birmingham City University has launched a Masters Degree in Social Media.

This course is designed for the end user academic with no IT background. he aim is to build and develop networks using the usual S & M tools that we all know and love (or hate). Students will learn how to use Social Networking within a business context. This includes low cost marketing and PR. It will also teach people about blogging and podcasting

The organiser is @johnhickman. He told the The Daily Telegraph that the course is "... not for freaks or IT geeks, the tools learnt on this course will be accessible to many people."

There has been some criticism of the new course. In the same Telegraph article a student at the university called it a "... a complete waste of university resources" and that "... most people know all this stuff already".

He's got a point. There is a great deal of information on social networks on the web. Much of it is free and there are plenty of lovely people around who are happy to share their experience. There is also a strong argument that the last thing the Internet needs is an army of highly trained PRs flooding our virtual galaxy. Having said, that without seeing a full breakdown of the course details it's easy to dismiss this as a course for newbies.

There is also one aspect which piqued my interest and that was the research element:

"The research-based nature of this MA draws upon the expertise of the Interactive Cultures research unit based in the Birmingham School of Media (http://interactivecultures.org/). Our established and innovative work with music and radio industries, policy, cultural entrepreneurship as well as the practices of social media will inform class work and the directions of individual scholarship."

Much of social networking development is by entrepreneurs who are talented and very clever but are essentially start-ups, not all of which will last long. Academic institutions can contribute to the Social Media industry and could enhance new and existing services by providing them with a forum to work with. If I were developing a hot new Twitter based app, I'd be knocking on their door wanting to hook up with them.

An academic research centre will also create a timeline of Social Media's development. Sadly, a number of great services that we know and love now, will not succeed and wither away. In time, a Social Media research centre will, presumably, have data on legacy services and allow aspiring gurus to look back on applications of the past and learn valuable lessons from what they did and what they did wrong.

So all in all I think it's a good thing. I only wish I had the £4000 to pay for the course.

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