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      Newsletter: Blog, New Registration, New Billing, New App!

      singpolyma · Thursday, 19 August, 2021 - 00:30 · 2 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it's been a while since you checked out JMP, here's a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has a Jabber client. Among other things, JMP has these features: Your phone number on every device; Multiple phone numbers, one app; Free as in Freedom; Share one number with multiple people.

    In case you haven't seen it yet, we now have an XMPP-powered blog! All newsletter updates, as well as other content like technical deep-dives will be published there. If you just want these updates, don't worry, the mailing list isn't going away. You can check out the blog at https://blog.jmp.chat and follow in your RSS reader or compatible Jabber client such as Movim or Libervia.

    JMP also has a new registration flow. This flow properly integrates with our new billing system and represents a lot of behind-the-scenes work to our architecture. The most important part of the new billing system is the referral system. That's right, JMP users can now get single-use invite codes to refer users. The new user gets one free month, and if they decide to upgrade to a paid account the original user will get a free month of credit too! XMPP server operators for closed or vetted groups can also contact support to ask that their server be added to an approved list where all Jabber IDs coming from that server will be given a free month, with the resulting credit if they upgrade going to the server operator.

    Speaking of our new billing system, many users have been fully migrated to the new architecture which says goodbye to PayPal and hello to automated credit card and Bitcoin deposits, as well as official support for payment by mail or (in Canada) Interac e-Transfer. Payments can also be made in Bitcoin Cash by contacting support. Users on the new system now have a prepaid balance they can top up any time they like, with the option to automatically top-up a low balance with any amount $15 or more from credit card. Deposits over $30 get a 3% bonus added, and deposits over $140 get a 5% bonus. This paves the way for calling minutes over 120 / month (which will soon be available at the rate of $0.0087 / minute) and also international calling at per-minute rates to be announced later this year. Those who prefer to pay the same amount every month or year, as is done with our legacy PayPal system, will need to wait a bit until we integrate that option into the new system.

    We've also had a volunteer working with us to prepare some new features for Android users, most notably DTMF (punching in numbers during a call) so that all phone calls can be done from inside Conversations. The code isn't quite ready for upstream yet, but drop by the chatroom if you want to try out a prototype.

    As always, if you have any questions, feel free to reply to this email or find us in the group chat per below. We're happy to chat whenever we're available!

    To learn what's happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a wonderful rest of your week!

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      Newsletter: One app for calls/SMS, automated Bitcoin support, and more!

      Denver Gingerich · Wednesday, 24 March, 2021 - 17:00 · 3 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom For Your Phone Number”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    The past few months have been busy and exciting for us! We’ve been implementing several new features, doing a ton of work on our payment system to make future additions like adding balance and checking expiry much easier, and also adding new payment methods, all with the help of two new employees! More on that below, but first, let’s talk about those new features:

    First of all, thanks to our new full-time employee, Christopher, we now have fully bi-directional calling over XMPP! Previously we supported incoming calls over XMPP (per the XMPP/Jingle calling options in Q17 at https://jmp.chat/#bot), but outgoing calls is new! Using XMPP clients that support calling, such as Conversations, Movim, and Gajim, you can initiate a call by adding the contact you want to call just as you’d add a texting contact, then tapping the call icon to initiate the call. This feature is still in alpha, but many users have reported it works well, so we encourage you to give it a try! Note that most XMPP clients do not support punching in numbers mid-call (“DTMF”) - we’re actively exploring the best ways to get that added to popular clients. Now that we have both incoming and outgoing calls available through XMPP, many users will find they only need one app for JMP: the XMPP client they already have!

    Secondly, also thanks to Christopher, we have a new command bot, which will eventually replace the JMP account bot. This bot lets us keep the ad-hoc commands that we continue to support for various account settings, while also letting people use the commands in XMPP clients that don’t support ad-hoc commands (such as Conversations). To get started with the new command bot send a message to xmpp:cheogram.com (that’s the Jabber ID “cheogram.com”) - “help” will list the commands, and you can type any unique command name or name prefix to run that command. Let us know what you think!

    Another new feature we’ve added in the past few months is automated Bitcoin payments, so you can now add funds to your account using Bitcoin right from our website, without needing to ask support. If you prefer other cryptocurrencies, for now we recommend SimpleSwap, MorphToken, ChangeNOW, or Godex to do the conversion - we plan to add native support for Monero as our next cryptocurrency.

    As mentioned earlier we have two new employees: Christopher (aka psycotica0), who has been working on the calling and bot features, and Stephen (aka singpolyma), who is making most of the new core payment system and other infrastructure updates. Christopher started at the beginning of January full-time, and Stephen started last month working part-time for JMP (after volunteering with us for several years). It’s awesome to have new people on board and we’re very excited for how quickly we’ll be able to make JMP even better! With our new employees fully onboarded now, Denver (ossguy) will be on sabbatical starting in the next few weeks, until approximately November this year. So if you are accustomed to asking your JMP questions directly to Denver, now is the time to switch to our usual support channels, per https://jmp.chat/#support - the others on the team will be happy to help! Also, note that our support reply window is now “within 8 business hours” - we may reply on the weekend, but it is not guaranteed.

    As always, if you have any questions, feel free to reply to this email or find us in the group chat per below. We’re happy to chat whenever we’re available!

    To learn what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a wonderful rest of your week!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: Calls to your XMPP client! And 46 more countries with new SGX!

      Denver Gingerich · Wednesday, 2 September, 2020 - 17:09 · 2 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom For Your Phone Number”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    We have a couple big items to announce this month, so we’ll dive right in!

    First of all, you can now receive phone calls directly in your XMPP client! We have tested this extensively with Conversations and Movim, and we believe other clients to work well too, including Gajim and Siskin. Any client that supports Jingle calling should work. To switch from using the JMP SIP account (the default) to using Jingle voice (XMPP calling) for incoming calls, use the ‘j’ command of the JMP account bot:

    1. send ‘j’ to account@jmp.chat (if the link doesn’t open, add account@jmp.chat to your XMPP contact list)
    2. if it shows you’re using the JMP SIP account, then send the text ‘j enable’ to turn on Jingle calls
    3. all calls to your JMP number will now ring your XMPP client!

    We are working on outgoing Jingle call support as well, but it’s not quite ready yet. Stay tuned here (or in the group chat below) to learn when you can try it out! For more on how Jingle calling works and the other Jingle/SIP bridging features, check out https://sip.cheogram.com/

    Secondly, there is now a way to use Cheogram (to do SMS over XMPP) with phone numbers from 46 more countries! This is provided by a new Soprani.ca project called the Vonage SGX, which we sponsor. You can find out more at https://wiki.soprani.ca/VonageSetup

    While not part of JMP, we wanted to mention it here since many have asked about support for more countries. With the Vonage SGX you maintain your own account with Vonage, and Vonage answers any phone network questions you have. The Soprani.ca community can help with any questions related to the Vonage SGX itself, in the Soprani.ca group chat mentioned below.

    There have been a bunch of new features added to JMP as well since our last email (mostly in the JMP account bot at xmpp:account@jmp.chat), including several related to group texting. If you’d like to try out our group texting support so far, please reply to this email or contact support via https://jmp.chat/#support

    Stay tuned for our next update email to learn about even more new features and our plans to officially remove the “beta” flag!

    To learn what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a wonderful week!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: Celebrating 3 years of JMP! And some LibrePlanet Canada news!

      Denver Gingerich · Saturday, 15 February, 2020 - 18:00 · 3 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom For Your Phone Number”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    Today is JMP’s 3 year anniversary! That’s right, we launched JMP exactly 3 years ago, and have been chipping away at Big Telecom ever since. 😉 We’ve got a fair bit planned for the next 3 years, and are excited to bring it all to you as it’s ready.

    Before we go into those details, we wanted to let you know about a couple of excellent events coming up next month that JMP is involved in. Here they are:

    • LibrePlanet Canada Satellite Edition! This is a new conference in 2020, which will be happening concurrently with the US LibrePlanet conference in Boston, May 14-15. From the website: “For the first time ever, all the great presentations of LibrePlanet are coming to Canada! Bringing in the main talks via live stream, with space for local hallway track and more, LibrePlanet Canada Satellite Edition is your chance to meet with like-minded participants and take in the event from Canada.” It’s happening at the Delta Hotel in Waterloo, Ontario. JMP is an official sponsor of LibrePlanet Canada Satellite Edition - more on that in a bit. Also, you’ll be able to chat with some JMP people in person, including core contributor Stephen Paul Weber!
    • LibrePlanet in Boston! The original LibrePlanet continues for its 12th year, this time at the Back Bay Events Center. Check out some wonderful speakers and booths at this excellent conference devoted to software freedom. JMP is very likely to be included in LibrePlanet’s raffle and/or door prizes so be sure to keep an eye out for those!

    As for development work, we’ve got a number of projects on the go. Behind the scenes we’ve been updating our code to use a completely new API from our carrier, which will be mostly invisible to users, but does have some cool new features we hope to be alpha testing with some of you soon. In particular, we’re excited to be rolling out group texting (both sending and receiving) in the coming months! If you’d like to alpha test, please just reply to this email and let us know - we’ll set you up in the next month or so.

    And along the lines of new features, we’ve also been improving our payment system at the same time. As part of our sponsorship agreement with them, we’re currently running payments for LibrePlanet Canada Satellite Edition through our new payment provider, which will let us do credit card subscriptions directly without needing PayPal (still some development work to do there, but let us know if you’d like to alpha test the new provider for your next payment). And we’re also automating the currently-manual process we have for accepting Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Stay tuned!

    If you’d like to know what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a great weekend! We’re looking forward to many more years of JMP and hope that you are too!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: JMP at LinuxFest Northwest this weekend - stop by and say hi!

      Denver Gingerich · Wednesday, 24 April, 2019 - 17:02 · 1 minute

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom For Your Phone Number”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    As mentioned last month, we’ll have a booth at LinuxFest Northwest, which is happening this weekend! If you’re in or near northwest Washington state (specifically Bellingham Technical College), it’s a great chance to meet people in free and open source software and learn about a variety of amazing topics - the talks and exhibit hall are free of charge. At the JMP booth we’ll have pamphlets and JMP stickers, and you can pay for JMP anonymously in cash at the booth if you like. Also, feel free to just stop by and say hi!

    There are some opening events on Friday (April 26) with the main conference and booths open Saturday and Sunday (April 27-28). There will be a raffle happening on both main conference days after the talks - we’ve submitted our usual prizes (JMP subscriptions) so you may be able to win one of those! For a complete event and talk list, see https://www.linuxfestnorthwest.org/conferences/2019/schedule/events

    In other news, we had a wonderful time at LibrePlanet last month and we’re looking forward to future LibrePlanet events. Our raffle prizes were a big hit and it was great to meet so many JMP users and enthusiasts there!

    If you’d like to know what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a great day! We’re looking forward to seeing some of you at LinuxFest Northwest!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: Join us at LinuxFest Northwest and LibrePlanet!

      Denver Gingerich · Wednesday, 20 March, 2019 - 17:08 · 2 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom For Your Phone Number”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    As promised, we have some more details about upcoming conferences we’ll be at: We’re very excited to announce that we’ll be at LinuxFest Northwest this year - our booth has been confirmed and we’re preparing our booth materials now. As usual, we will have pamphlets and JMP stickers, and you can pay for JMP anonymously in cash at the booth if you like. Or just stop by and say hi! LinuxFest Northwest is happening April 26-28 at Bellingham Technical College in Bellingham, Washington, just an hour or two from both Vancouver (BC) and Seattle. There is an excellent lineup of speakers, and an extensive exhibition area with lots of great organizations. Also, admission to the exhibition area and talks is free! For full details, and to register, see https://www.linuxfestnorthwest.org/conferences/2019

    We’ll also be at LibrePlanet, which is happening this weekend (March 23-24) at MIT! While JMP will not have a booth this year, we’re participating in the raffle again, where you can win a JMP subscription. As with FOSDEM, a few people from JMP will be at LibrePlanet, including our founder - we’ll be wearing T-shirts with a large JMP logo on the back. We’re very happy to talk about JMP if you happen to run into us; don’t be afraid to say hi!

    In other news, we are getting closer to offering additional international messaging and calling options. In particular, we are now in the testing phase for iNum, which means we will soon be able to offer new phone numbers from the iNum calling code, which are reachable from most carriers worldwide. If you’ve been waiting for a JMP number outside Canada and the US, this will be your chance! For more on iNum, see https://www.inum.net/ or reply to this email - we’re happy to discuss how iNum might work for you.

    If you’d like to know what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a great day! We’re looking forward to seeing some of you at LibrePlanet this weekend and LinuxFest Northwest next month!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: JMP at FOSDEM next weekend, plus SeaGL recap!

      Denver Gingerich · Friday, 25 January, 2019 - 19:31 · 1 minute

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages (and calls) through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom For Your Phone Number”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    If you’re in or around Brussels next weekend (February 2-3), we highly recommend checking out FOSDEM, one of the biggest free/libre software conferences out there, and entirely community-run (see https://fosdem.org/2019/practical/ for details - no registration is required, just show up!). A few people from JMP will be there, including our founder (who will also be at https://wiki.xmpp.org/web/Summit_23 , which you can join as well) - we’ll be wearing T-shirts with a large JMP logo on the back. While we won’t have a booth at FOSDEM this year, we’re very happy to talk about JMP if you happen to run into us; don’t be afraid to say hi!

    We had a great time at SeaGL in Seattle this past November - thanks to everyone who stopped by our booth! It was wonderful to chat and learn more about what people like in JMP and how they’re using it. Stay tuned for more on which conferences we’ll be exhibiting at in the near future!

    If you’d like to know what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Thanks for reading and have a great day! We’re looking forward to seeing some of you at FOSDEM!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: JMP this month: on Motherboard, what's up at LibrePlanet!

      Denver Gingerich · Friday, 5 January, 2018 - 19:08 · 2 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update, this month giving a special welcome to all the new subscribers that found us via Motherboard (more on that below)!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom for SMS”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    Here’s what’s been going on with JMP and Soprani.ca over the past month and a bit:

    And here’s what’s coming up in the near future:

    Last month we completed some of the final organizational steps needed in order to accept recurring payments without using PayPal (paperwork is fun!). We’ll be implementing the technical side of this next, so we hope to have new recurring payment options (that don’t require you to use PayPal) and plan options within the next couple months. In the meantime, you can still pay for your JMP account using Bitcoin Cash or Bitcoin (just reply to this email or contact us per https://jmp.chat/#payment for details), as well as the usual/default PayPal methods, along with a few other options you can ask us about.

    If you’d like to know what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Our current top priorities for next features (roughly in order) are: behind-the-scenes work to make JMP more scalable, additional plan and payment options, and automated Bitcoin Cash and Bitcoin payment support. We’ll be sure to keep you in the loop on all the new developments.

    Thanks for reading and have a great weekend!

    • person chevron_right

      Newsletter: Radical Networks recap, easy porting, and the new WOM!

      Denver Gingerich · Wednesday, 29 November, 2017 - 18:35 · 2 minutes

    Hi everyone!

    Welcome to the latest edition of your pseudo-monthly JMP update, coming to you from our “fancy” new Mailman setup!

    In case it’s been a while since you checked out JMP, here’s a refresher: JMP lets you send and receive text and picture messages through a real phone number right from your computer, tablet, phone, or anything else that has an XMPP client. JMP’s tagline, “Freedom for SMS”, captures the freedom that JMP gives you from traditional cell phone carriers, as well as the fully-free nature of all the software that powers JMP (licensed entirely under AGPLv3+).

    Here’s what’s been going on with JMP and Soprani.ca over the past month and a bit:

    And here’s what’s coming up in the somewhat distant future:

    A number of people that work on JMP, including JMP’s founder and lead developer, will be at LibrePlanet, which is happening March 24-25 in the Boston area. If you’re interested in free/libre software (like JMP), this is really the conference to be at. Registration, and further info, are here: https://libreplanet.org/2018/ We hope to see you there!

    If you’d like to know what’s happening with JMP between emails like this, here are some ways you can find out:

    Our current top priorities for next features (roughly in order) are: behind-the-scenes work to make JMP more scalable, additional plan and payment options, and official Bitcoin payment support (we already accept it unofficially - reply for details). We’ll be sure to keep you in the loop on all the new developments.

    Thanks for reading and have a great week!