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To: Bux who wrote (53247)	12/9/1999 2:06:00 PM
From: Ruffian	Respond to of 152472

HAL Comes To Your Handset Intuitive, Gee-whiz Voice Technology Aids Mobile E-mail By Brad Smith William Erdman thinks science fiction when he talks about e-mail. But the 8 billion e-mails sent around the world daily are serious business for the CEO of Authentix Inc. The Tucson, Ariz., company–founded nearly five years ago with a wireless fraud prevention services portfolio–is bringing to portable e-mail something reminiscent of the computer HAL 9000 from “2001: A Space Odyssey.” That's the analogy Erdman likes to use when he talks about how people want to receive their e-mail on the go. “Did HAL have a keyboard and a screen? No, he talked to you,” Erdman says. In the scope of history, it wasn't until recently that people starting communicating with something other than voice. That's why Erdman thinks Authenix's newest service, called SimplySay, is a no-brainer. The service, being beta-tested by about 20 carriers, converts desktop e-mail to voice that is delivered over a wireless or wireline phone. Once it is launched in early 2000 users can have their e-mail read to them anywhere they have wireless service. It works with either digital or analog handsets. Andrew Schroepfer, vice president and senior research analyst with US Bancorp Piper Jaffray Inc., says SimplySay is “very sexy” in the context of services that make e-mail more easily accessible and productive. He sees a big future for voice-enabled enhanced services generally. SimplySay is straightforward to set up from a desktop PC. A customer's account, using their wireless phone number, is opened with the Authentix service bureau. If the user gets e-mail through Microsoft Outlook, it can be configured to automatically forward e-mail to the SimplySay account. The subscriber calls the SimplySay toll-free number, provides a pass code and uses voice commands to listen to, delete or save e-mail. The e-mail continues to reside on the desktop as well. Users can respond to the e-mail over their handsets. There is a “user's manual” that comes with SimplySay, but it is only the size of a business card. E-mail is the first service to be provided by SimplySay, but Erdman says the company plans to provide more services in the future, such as directions, stock prices and weather. Authentix is marketing SimplySay to carriers, who can offer the service to their customers as a competitive differentiator. “This is a value-added service that can reduce churn and improve customer loyalty,” Erdman says. Also, Authentix is using what he calls “best of breed” hardware and software on top of its own proprietary platform. Authentix partners include Nuance Communications Inc., which has developed the voice-interface software. Erdman says Authentix provides the “glue” that holds the various components together. If a new and better product becomes available it can be easily plugged into the existing platform. Initially, Authentix will provide SimplySay as a service bureau offering but it may sell the equipment to carriers in the future, he says.

To: Bux who wrote (53247)	12/9/1999 2:10:00 PM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Bux, I have all-I-can-eat on ADSL with puter always on. Actually, I have a limit, but can't remember what it is. If I just leave video running I'll be paying, but haven't had to so far. My limit is brainspace and bandwidth, of which I find I don't have very much. Maybe Dr J has figured that WWeb can be handled on that basis. Nearly always, I'm not sending or receiving data, just sitting here clicking on the keyboard or trying to soak stuff into my head which is already on the screen. But I'm inclined to agree with you that it would be better to charge by the bit transmitted or received. With the bit priced according to how busy Babe the base station is. If nearing capacity, the Cat's eyes would show $8 $8 per kilobyte. Then when quiet, the cat would go away and the rats would play. I too keep multiple browsers and functions going. Having a lot of memory [10 time RAM what I thought in 1990 would be enough hard disk space to see me out - I'd bought a 40 megabyte hard disk puter in an act of sheer wild abandon]. Now my hard disk is measured in the 10s of gigabytes and RAM is about 300 or something megabytes and the ASIC goes fast and the twisted pair zooms information through in a hurry. The puter this year cost the same as that in 1990. This is The New Paradigm in action. Maybe the cost of HDR really is so low that Kyros, you and I are living in the past - the 1990 equivalent of my puter. Dr J probably has a reasonable idea. 14.4kbps is simply absurd for WWeb. Korea Freetel will demonstrate customer demand. It's amazing that marketers are so dozey that they think data is a dog. Then again, having been in the midst of marketers, it doesn't surprise me. They want customers to tell them what they want! They think they can do market research to figure out what to do - yes, it helps, but understanding customers is more important than asking them what they want. They don't know. They learn what they want once they see it going somewhere and use the time-honored monkey see, monkey do approach. They'll buy billions of tons of WWeb and it'll be FAST. Mqurice PS: WWeb Marketing 101 WHEN THE CAT'S AWAY THE RATS WILL PLAY

To: Bux who wrote (53247)	12/9/1999 3:24:00 PM
From: S100	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 152472

Connection Speed Comments. I tend to agree with you that lower speeds are OK, esp since that is what I am getting with a cable modem. I started out years ago with a 2400 baud modem on Prodigy and was up to K56Flex with a local ISP. I have been using a cable modem for the last 6 months. VERY few sites are that much faster with the cable modem. Using the cable modem, I get speeds in the middle of the range on the following url. computingcentral.com However, loading the page for SI takes what seems like close to a minute. I believe that I would not notice much difference if I were using a 28.8 modem for SI or even a lower speed modem. The same with most other sites, but I guess I can keep more info from more sites current using the faster connection. I use the NT operating system and multiple browsers (Netscape and IE) with multiple windows. Also run the Island Book Java applet and Window on WallStreet. I have been on for about 3 hours and using the command netstat -s generated the total stats for this time. This gives about 1.5 packets per second, if I keyed this into my calculator correctly, not sure of the average packet size, may be about 500 bytes. Output of netstat follows: IP Statistics Packets Received = 15876 Received Header Errors = 0 Received Address Errors = 0 Datagrams Forwarded = 0 Unknown Protocols Received = 0 Received Packets Discarded = 0 Received Packets Delivered = 15876 Output Requests = 11633 Routing Discards = 0 Discarded Output Packets = 0 Output Packet No Route = 0 Reassembly Required = 0 Reassembly Successful = 0 Reassembly Failures = 0 Datagrams Successfully Fragmented = 0 Datagrams Failing Fragmentation = 0 Fragments Created = 0 ICMP Statistics Received Sent Messages 147 4 Errors 0 0 Destination Unreachable 145 2 Time Exceeded 0 0 Parameter Problems 0 0 Source Quenchs 0 0 Redirects 0 0 Echos 0 2 Echo Replies 2 0 Timestamps 0 0 Timestamp Replies 0 0 Address Masks 0 0 Address Mask Replies 0 0 TCP Statistics Active Opens = 329 Passive Opens = 3 Failed Connection Attempts = 10 Reset Connections = 28 Current Connections = 7 Segments Received = 10887 Segments Sent = 10796 Segments Retransmitted = 52 UDP Statistics Datagrams Received = 664 No Ports = 4325 Receive Errors = 0 Datagrams Sent = 783