Another article I found today about the military using webcams, email and technology in general to keep families in touch while they are deployed across the world.
I know I’ve blogged on this before, but thought it nice that it’s still being done and growing in popularity & availability.
My hat is off to all of those in service, which is especially hard during the holidays.
ciao for now
This is a great article I found on Japanese families that live abroad in keeping their family ties close with the use of live webcams.
THE FAMILY–Seeking stronger bonds / Kin use IT to overcome distance
The following is the last of the final six installments of the yearlong “Family” series focusing on the impact of rapidly growing internationalization on contemporary families.
As mixed-nationality marriages increase and Japanese families increasingly find themselves living abroad, many are turning to the Internet and other forms of electronic communication to keep in touch with family members living in other countries.
Shunichi Futagami, a 60-year-old executive in Matsuyama, looks forward to talking to his grandson, who lives in Michigan, via his computer’s webcam every weekend.
“Good morning, Hiro-chan,” he greeted the 1-year-old Hiroki on the Internet at 10 p.m. on a Sunday, which was 8 a.m. in the U.S. state. Hiroki smiled at his grandfather as his father, Takahiro, and mother, Mikako, appeared behind him.
The Futagamis began this weekend ritual after Takahiro was transferred to his company’s subsidiary in the United States. Futagami’s wife and daughters join him when he talks with Takahiro on the Net.
“I think my family’s ties have become stronger than when we all lived in the same country,” Futagami said.
Kayoko Roppongi’s six family members live in four countries.
That’s all for now.
Well it looks as if my favorite web portal & search engine directory is coming on strong in the VOIP wars. Yahoo has been a leader in the search, messaging and webcam world for many years. I’m not shocked to see Yahoo step-up and take on some of these new fish in the pond. Good for them, and I wish them the best. They really do offer some of the best services online.
Here’s an excerp from the article I read this morning:
Yahoo! targets! Skype! with! improved! VoIP! offer!
Yahoo! is adding more features to its existing VoIP service in a bid to gain a bigger of the rapidly growing broadband telephony market.
A new version of Yahoo!’s Messenger service is due to be released soon that will enable users to make broadband calls that are reportedly cheaper than those on offer by VoIP giant Skype.
The new offer includes PC-to-phone calling and inbound calling with prices for calls ranging from 1 cent a minute to US destinations and 1.9 cents per minute to 30 other countries. Punters will also be able to choose phone numbers for incoming calls in the US, UK and France for $2.99 per month or $29.90 per year.
According to Jan Dawson, principal analyst at Ovum, Yahoo! is “frustrated” that Skype is “grabbing all the VoIP headlines when Yahoo! has been offering PC to PC calling for five years and webcam-based video calling for several years as well”.
That’s all for now, WebcamsGuru
I figured it’s been a bit since I’ve posted. Here’s a webcam news item I stumbled across today.
TechWeb via Yahoo! News Thu, 01 Dec 2005 17:10:00 GMT
Logitech and Creative, which together own about three-quarters of the Webcam market, joined Skype on Thursday to co-market the Luxembourg-based VoIP developer’s newest software with their cameras and headsets.
Read Full Webcam Article
Here’s another interesting article on how military couples are using webcams and IM to keep themselves ‘connected’ in that special way while deployed. Checkout the blog entry and link to another related story on this topic:
http://wiredblogs.tripod.com/sex/index.blog?entry_id=1262046
type-atcha-later, WebcamsGuru
I recently found out on a forum that I frequent that google has plans to launch it’s own instant messenger software! It’s about time is what I say. They have a great search engine, a fledgling ‘groups’ area that needs to be more modeled after yahoo and msn, but hey it’s a start. They have a great free email service, next I’m guessing chat & an expanded ‘directory’ of their own would rock. Dmoz is fine but it’s not google google now is it?
Anyways, I’ll try to post more often with the latest goings on in the interactive online world. My excuse is that I’ve been tied up trying to develop a health portal, planning for a potential move to Arizona so the wife can finish her school and I can get back to it.
Here’s the link for the article on google’s plan to start it’s own IM service: http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/internet/08/23/google.messaging.reut/index.html
Today is the first time I’ve added an article that wasn’t specifically geared towards webcams. This blog, although primarily geared towards live webcams will also be for chatting about anything ‘online and interactive’ such as chat, IM, webcams, p2p, etc. I’ll try to keep the focus on webcams but thought it’d be a little dry without including those other interesting aspects of the Internet.
Today’s addition to the webcam news archive is an article from wired on Hollywood’s use of IM (apple’s ichat) to find jobs and post job status. Not shocking that they have been using this tool that we (us geeks) have all been using for years now.
The shocking revelation of this news article is that Hollywood is a “Mac town” and that IM isn’t just for teenagers anymore! LOL Glad that cat’s outta the bag. 
Anyways, I thought it was an interesting article as it portrays the ever mainstreaming of Internet technology into day to day life.
That’s all for now, have a great day and an awesome rest of the week!
type-atcha-later…