You would have done better linking to the technology page (gushing marketspeak and "Cloud Communicartions APIs" notwithstanding) in the first place, instead of the barely decipherable press release. Explain what you offer before you throw
gobbledygook like "cPaaS" at us.
In the past, I've Voxeo IVR platforms, and they were relatively serviceable, if poorly documented. I'm confused about the division between Voxeo Labs and Voxeo, why the separate entity?
You make a good point, although we have little control about who links to what: But for those that care, Here's the technology page: http://voxeolabs.com/ameche/technology/
On your question regarding the division between Voxeo Labs and Voxeo:
Since 1999 Voxeo Corporation (HQ in Orlando) has had a very strong IVR (Interactive Voice Response) business and continues to grow and excel in that market. Voxeo's main offerings includes Prophecy (hosted and premise) and VoiceObjects.
Voxeo Labs (formed in 2009, with HQ in San Francisco) is a separate wholly-owned subsidiary focused on real-time communications. Labs is responsible for Tropo, Phono, PRISM and now Ameche.
Two completely different engineering teams, marketing teams, management teams and missions. But every once in a while we all still get together and play softball.
Disclaimer: I'm the Chief Evangelist for Voxeo Labs, so my opinions in here are always true. ;)
Thank you for the feedback and for pointing out the typo on the technology page.
We discussed the "language" issue extensively before this announcement. The fundamental challenge we faced was that this announcement - at this time - is not targeted at developers. The "gushing market-speak" and press release language were intended for a specific audience. Based on the companies who contacted us to learn more about Ameche yesterday, it appears we reached our specific target market as we desired.
We will have a more in-depth, technology and developer focused Ameche announcement and release at a later time.
You mentioned "In the past, I've [used] Voxeo IVR platforms..." and I wanted to comment on that.
Voxeo's IVR platform (Prophecy) is recognized by Gartner and Datamonitor as industry leading. Prophecy is used in the largest IVR deployments in the world (more than 50,000 ports for a single customer application) and the smallest (single-line micro-banking applications in Africa).
Voxeo is also extremely customer focused. We have a reputation for being so that is shown by our customer retention rate (over 99%) and customer satisfaction scores.
I and everyone else at Voxeo are extremely interested in improving Prophecy and our other products in any way possible. If you have any specific criticism of our platforms or our documentation I'd love to hear it. I'll pay you for your time to talk with us about the things you disliked. Please let me know if you'd be up for that. You can reply here or contact me via @visionik on Twitter.
I'm still a little lost on exactly what this is. The only two things I found under the technology link were node.js and SmartOS. Do you spin up SmartOS/node instances and somehow hook SIP to them? Can you give us a technical explanation?
> Do you spin up SmartOS/node instances and somehow hook SIP to them?
That's the impression I got too. The code sample suggests almost a middle layer? Regular users place phone calls as normal using regular phones, while this middle layer is triggered based on conditions and performs actions.
Ameche is a Node.js PaaS that links deeply into the telco network to let developers put ‘apps’ in people's REAL calls and text conversations. Unlike Tropo and Twilio that require you to get a new phone number, Ameche is being connected with major phone companies around he world to let you hack your real mobile phone calls. With Ameche, you'll be able to build your own Google Voice on steroids without having to juggle multiple dialers or use their clumsy 'dial back' stuff.
On the technical front, Ameche speaks SIP/IMS on one side and Node.js on the other. We also have complete control over the media so you can inject little sound icons into your calls or create ad-hoc conferences while on a real phone call.
But the best part is how developers will be able to make money. With Tropo and Twilio today, you have to get a new phone number, build an app and then find a way to get people to use it. With Ameche, we're creating an OAuth flow that will allow users to add these apps to their phone service with a single click (like Facebook) and then have the developer collect revenue share from the carriers (like Apple does on the App Store). That way you can just write a cool app, list it on an app catalog or promote it yourself and then sit back and watch the cash roll in.
It's still early days so stay tuned to the blog. We'll be announcing the first set of Ameche-enabled carriers in the next couple months.
Thanks, much appreciated. So it is essentially a node.js VM with hooks that let you alter calls that already exist inside the big carrier networks.
My humble suggestion would be to get rid of all the marketing-speak on your website and lead with what you just wrote here. It is very frustrating to have to dig through statements about what this or that can mean to you without the basic understanding of what this is in the first place. Fire your marketing guy. ;)
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[ 4.7 ms ] story [ 33.8 ms ] threadFor technical details, visit http://voxeolabs.com/ameche/technology/
In the past, I've Voxeo IVR platforms, and they were relatively serviceable, if poorly documented. I'm confused about the division between Voxeo Labs and Voxeo, why the separate entity?
On your question regarding the division between Voxeo Labs and Voxeo:
Since 1999 Voxeo Corporation (HQ in Orlando) has had a very strong IVR (Interactive Voice Response) business and continues to grow and excel in that market. Voxeo's main offerings includes Prophecy (hosted and premise) and VoiceObjects.
Voxeo Labs (formed in 2009, with HQ in San Francisco) is a separate wholly-owned subsidiary focused on real-time communications. Labs is responsible for Tropo, Phono, PRISM and now Ameche.
Two completely different engineering teams, marketing teams, management teams and missions. But every once in a while we all still get together and play softball.
Disclaimer: I'm the Chief Evangelist for Voxeo Labs, so my opinions in here are always true. ;)
We discussed the "language" issue extensively before this announcement. The fundamental challenge we faced was that this announcement - at this time - is not targeted at developers. The "gushing market-speak" and press release language were intended for a specific audience. Based on the companies who contacted us to learn more about Ameche yesterday, it appears we reached our specific target market as we desired.
We will have a more in-depth, technology and developer focused Ameche announcement and release at a later time.
You mentioned "In the past, I've [used] Voxeo IVR platforms..." and I wanted to comment on that.
Voxeo's IVR platform (Prophecy) is recognized by Gartner and Datamonitor as industry leading. Prophecy is used in the largest IVR deployments in the world (more than 50,000 ports for a single customer application) and the smallest (single-line micro-banking applications in Africa).
Voxeo is also extremely customer focused. We have a reputation for being so that is shown by our customer retention rate (over 99%) and customer satisfaction scores.
I and everyone else at Voxeo are extremely interested in improving Prophecy and our other products in any way possible. If you have any specific criticism of our platforms or our documentation I'd love to hear it. I'll pay you for your time to talk with us about the things you disliked. Please let me know if you'd be up for that. You can reply here or contact me via @visionik on Twitter.
Thanks again,
-Jonathan (Chairman of Voxeo)
That's the impression I got too. The code sample suggests almost a middle layer? Regular users place phone calls as normal using regular phones, while this middle layer is triggered based on conditions and performs actions.
Very cool, if that's the case.
There's a diagram of how the different components would plug together with a phone company's IMS network at http://voxeolabs.com/files/2012/10/NetworkArchitectureFull.p...
Ameche is a Node.js PaaS that links deeply into the telco network to let developers put ‘apps’ in people's REAL calls and text conversations. Unlike Tropo and Twilio that require you to get a new phone number, Ameche is being connected with major phone companies around he world to let you hack your real mobile phone calls. With Ameche, you'll be able to build your own Google Voice on steroids without having to juggle multiple dialers or use their clumsy 'dial back' stuff.
On the technical front, Ameche speaks SIP/IMS on one side and Node.js on the other. We also have complete control over the media so you can inject little sound icons into your calls or create ad-hoc conferences while on a real phone call.
But the best part is how developers will be able to make money. With Tropo and Twilio today, you have to get a new phone number, build an app and then find a way to get people to use it. With Ameche, we're creating an OAuth flow that will allow users to add these apps to their phone service with a single click (like Facebook) and then have the developer collect revenue share from the carriers (like Apple does on the App Store). That way you can just write a cool app, list it on an app catalog or promote it yourself and then sit back and watch the cash roll in.
It's still early days so stay tuned to the blog. We'll be announcing the first set of Ameche-enabled carriers in the next couple months.
My humble suggestion would be to get rid of all the marketing-speak on your website and lead with what you just wrote here. It is very frustrating to have to dig through statements about what this or that can mean to you without the basic understanding of what this is in the first place. Fire your marketing guy. ;)