It looks like there will be a huge leap in the way we interact with computers soon. No more inconvenient keyboards and inflexible mice. The iPhone is only the first commercially available gadget with multi-touch interface… the things possible with this technology can be seen in this video:
My first publication in a renown Journal has now been published. I’m quite proud of it… well, I’m not the first author, but one has to start small, eh?
I hope there will be more to come, but my diploma thesis work leading to this publication and being awarded the price for “Best Thesis Work” in BIN02 is a good start 
And no, I do not refer something innovative… it seems like the company has run out of clever new ideas and started milking the cash-cow with rising of fees…
It also seems like Skype reads the systems BIOS when starting up… now why would they do that? I will try to keep up with information on that. Not enough that they can use your computer as super-node at will, without you being able to disable this…
Update: it seems it was linked to some new DRM stuff. They promised to remove it. Source
It has been some time since I last posted about IP telephony. Many things have changed, Skype is widely used (even normal devices support the protocol now in hardware, making nice things like mobile-phone-like gadgets that can use public hotspots possible).
I ranted a lot about VoipBuster and similar offers, but it seems my fears were unfounded. Voipbuster now offers free landline calls to Austria and Switzerland, and cheap (1cent/min) to Germany not to mention free landline calls to exotic countries (Guam, Estonia, Iceland, USA (+mobile!)) and SMS text messaging.
Gizmo Project is another provider, and they now offer free (5min/day or 10 if you register) calls via a normal browser (plugin required).
edit: I forgot to mention Jajah. I had heard a report about this company some time ago. They also offer free or cheap calls, but you only have to enter the numbers into the webform, and they call you and the recipient and connect you. The special thing about this company is that it was founded by two Austrians!