Re: [Ekiga-list] Ekiga.net account with Android 2.3.4 native SIP-client

[Jānis Rukšāns <thedogfarted gmail com>]

On Mon, May 23, 2011 at 3:35 PM, Dave Koelmeyer <davekoelmeyer me com> wrote:
> On 20/05/11 08:02 PM, Bart Vandewoestyne wrote:
>>
>> Damien?  What's your opinion on changing the ekiga.net config so
>> that these issues get resolved?
>>
>> Kind regards,
>> Bart
>
> My concern is that for the end-user this is undermining the usefulness of
> Ekiga.net, and therefore adoption of Ekiga as a SIP client. I have tested
> *four* different Mac OS SIP clients from behind a NAT router, and all four
> of them cannot and will not connect to Ekiga.net:
>
> - Jistsi (aka Sip Communicator)
> - Telephone
> - Blink
> - X-Lite 4

You can add Empathy and Nokia N900 to that list.

> For the end-user, I can easily see this as a case of interoperability with
> Ekiga users potentially not being worth the effort, so move on to something
> else. It makes evangelising Ekiga for me (and SIP as an alternative to Skype
> for example) very challenging, when the promoted back-end service is broken
> with regards to cross-client interoperability.
>
> Some further discussion about this with a view to knowing if it can be
> resolved would be really useful at this point.

Promoting SIP as an alternative to Skype will always be challenging, due to:
1) The large user base of Skype, and different protocols being used.
Although there is an official Skype/SIP gateway, it is paid service,
buggy and limited in functionality (you cannot simply call any Skype
user).
2) NAT issues. In theory they are applying to Skype as well, but by
installing Skype you're agreeing that your computer can be used for
relaying other users' traffic, something that's not that easy with
SIP. Setting up a dedicated server for media relay however can be
expensive, and it doesn't scale well.

Also I think that the average user's mindset plays a role here. For
the non-computer savvy Jane Doe, VoIP and Skype are synonyms, just
like PC and Windows, or, until recently, the Internet and IE. People
will use whatever comes preinstalled, and one has to convince them
that the alternative is significantly better. Of course sub-par
services don't do any good here, but in the same time you cannot
expect Damien to provide a media relay server, given that the service
is gratis.

Just my $.02
-- 
Ian