Meet the new boss, same as the old boss...

VoIP euphoria continues on both sides of the Atlantic, but Richard Stastny gives us a much-needed reality check with this post on Microsoft's RTC initiative. Contextual presence and identity management, device neutrality, firewall traversal, platform-neutrality in IM, integration with Outlook. This is not merely an attempt to recreate traditional telephony in an IP skin, rather, it is an acknowledgement of the increasingly eclectic nature of communications behavior. Clearly this is enterprise-focused in its first iteration, but it would be silly to expect that the consumer space will remain unaffected. As one highly valued reader in industry recently wrote to me, "While we are doing a decent job at keeping our eyes on the ball I am increasingly concerned that the end-users are already off playing something else than ball..."

UPDATE: Ahem...