Is it just me, or was last week’s launch of Tello a non-event? Sure, they have a great pedigree; Tello was the brainchild of Vonage founder Jeff Pulver. The board includes Craig McCraw (started what became AT&T Wireless) and John Scully (of PepsiCo and later Apple notoriety). But their namesake product, which is aimed squarely at the corporate market, seems dead out of the starting gate.
What is Tello? It’s a buzzword laden tool that’s going to solve all our communication problems — if you believe the hype. Their big value proposition is presence; the ability to determine who is online, with what, where. Is Bob on Skype? Is he on the road? Can I reach him via email? Text chat? Voice?
The problem is, none of this is really new. Try as they might, Tello really can’t claim to have invented the concept or the functionality of presence. It’s been available for years. True, it’s not “integrated” with all the various and sundry means of communications available, but that is a pipe dream at this point anyway. And the pipe is filled with crack. Tellos offers to integrate, but only if you’re using the tools and systems they support. Which is no integration at all.
What’s really happening? The Washington Post, Forbes, and the other media channels fawning over Tellos are smitten by the star power of their board, and maybe even hitting the same crack pipe.
I have two objections to this. First, do I really need to be that accessible? Isn’t the cell phone good enough? Second, this is a hypothetical solution that has too many dependencies. If I wanted to use it today, it would only work if my friends also used it, and if we all used the same (supported) tools. If someone is on another network or tool, forget it.
So in theory this might be a good idea, but they haven’t delivered on that good idea yet.
I have two objections to this. First, do I really need to be that accessible? Isn’t the cell phone good enough? Second, this is a hypothetical solution that has too many dependencies. If I wanted to use it today, it would only work if my friends also used it, and if we all used the same (supported) tools. If someone is on another network or tool, forget it.
So in theory this might be a good idea, but they haven’t delivered on that good idea yet.