About a year ago when I was looking at what collaboration tools would support rich media on a PDA I looked at IsoSpace(see my blog on mobile video at: http://collaborate.com/cs_evl/collab.php/2005/03/23/p54#more54) and I just got briefed again by Ron Keusch (COO) a year later. To paraphrase a saying “what a difference a year makes!”

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I looked at the 4.8 beta version of IsoSpace (based in NYC), which only works with Internet Explorer (or Internet Exploder as Dave Antila likes to call it). There was no real download as it is a Java application. What is new is that they have a much better and more robust PC interface, and that they have integrated with Skype. So you can now detect presence through Skype, do a phone call through Skype, etc.

Another nice feature and a good security protocol is an auto-logout if you disconnect (or get disconnected) or try to get back in, IsoSpace makes you wait 10 seconds (which is not interminable) and also notifies you if you try to log in from another device.

Screen sharing is not as intuitive as I would have liked, you click on “Show” and a floating window comes up and then you can share anything on your desktop in that window with others.

On Demand Collaboration

What is most interesting about IsoSpace is that it is truly an “on-demand collaboration” application and integrates both synchronous and asynchronous funcitons pretty seamlessly. They start with communications and allow you in an integrated way to deal with any of the many forms (IM, e-mail, etc.) that are available today and then seamlessly escalate those communications into collaboration.

I Want a Roooom

IsoSpace is also persistent and has the notion of “rooms” (a persistent private space) and members (who can join a room if given permission). It also allows you to easily move contacts into groups for access, and security control. Rooms also have folders and documents as an organizational structure. IsoSpace has done a lot of work and now makes it easy to drag and drop folders, files or documents into a specific folder or a specific room. A listing of all the files and folders comes up in IsoSpace, so you can see what is in each room, etc.

New and Improved Interface

IsoSpace did a lot of work on their interface, removed 50 buttons and claim that it is only 1-2 clicks to get to any function. The work shows! If you click on someone’s name you get a popup control bar above the name showing (IM, e-mail, call or SMS) and you can choose which option on that bar you want to use to communicate. If you are both in the same room, a “meeting” option comes up on the control bar and allows you both to move into an ad-hoc web meeting (collaboration). You want video…they have video (courtesy of Flash Communication Server, now from Adobe), but they are looking to improve their video in future releases.

Skype in Skype Out

We have talked with a number of vendors that have used the Skype API to integrate with Skype. IsoSpace is another one, and in their case it is a smart move. However, the problem we have had recently is with the new Skype 2.0 version which supports video, is that it keeps unexpectedly dropping calls in the middle (we got disconnected three times in an hour briefing with IsoSpace). We have seen this happen over the last few weeks with a variety of different people, so it is a Skype issue, not an IsoSpace issue. I have heard this from various other people working with this new 2.0 version of Skype. I hope Skype gets its act together and fixes the problem soon, or I will have to go back to version 1.4, skip the video and get calls that don't drop!

Some Touches Missing

I could tell this was a beta release of IsoSpace because a few things had not yet been fully thought out. For example, when I dragged and dropped a presentation (3.6 megabytes) it should have given me an indication that it was being uploaded with a progress bar.

Another shortcoming is that when you do a screen share, there is no indication that you are sharing. Other tools (like Glance or Persony) have a flashing bar around the screen area you are sharing, so you don’t forget and start sharing your private e-mail with everyone else in the virtual meeting. But these things are minor, and will be ironed out by IsoSpace by the time they go production (few weeks).

Really Cool

What is really cool about IsoSpace is the Phone/PDA integration. Through the browser on your PDA/phone you an access any of the functions named above, web meetings, video conferencing, the file list from your rooms, presence of others, etc. If you have a Phone/PDA on WiFi or on the new EvDO networks, you can get decent connection speeds to take advantage of these IsoSpace features.

IsoSpace is definitely at the leading edge of mobile collaboration (one of the trends we identified in the 2006 RTC report (see: www.reports.collaborate.com)), is that today's buyers of collaboration technologies like it simple and robust (over feature rich, complicated, and requires training). As IsoSpace makes the product more “bullet proof” and easier to use we believe that they will get a greater rate of adoption! All that work they have done to cut out clicks, integrate with Nokia (Symbian OS) and Windows Mobile 5.0 phones, make the product not only easy to use but ubiquitous. This can only be a winning strategy.

Keywords: Skype, real time collaboration, mobile collaboration, IsoSpace, mobile connectivity, PDA/Phone, audio conferencing, video conferencing, data conferencing, web conferencing, webinars, web conference, user interface, on-demand collaboration, collaboration technologies, presence detection, Glance, Persony, screen sharing

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