Iraq Conflict Could Linger for a Decade or More

Military Familes Faced with Longer Deployments!

Well the cat is out of the bag as we discovered that the President of the United States expects the conflict to potentially be passed on to more than the next administration. It is a valiant gesture that our fighting men and women give to our nation in their service. Without their sacrifices we might have had to face the terrorist at home, on American soil, in our towns and neighborhoods.

Fighting terrorism is unlike any conflict that we have faced as a nation to date. As the conflict wages on the total size of our military deployment coupled with the potential term of conflict resolution increases our troop tours of duty. Military families are forced to bear the high cost of emotional and financial challenges.

Our sons, daughters, wives, fathers and mothers will be deployed for increasingly extended tours. Divorce rates among our troops is astronomically higher than the civilian divorce rate. It is the extended assignments, financial burdens of military spouses, and the distance, the overwhelming distance between families and the deployed soldiers.

Simple day to day tasks that we as civilians take for granted require unimaginable forethought and planning within families separated by the conflict in Iraq. Days and even weeks pass between communications between military families. Phone calls are expensive and letters are delayed. There is simply no effective immediate communication for these families.

ConnectFriend was designed as a portal for these types of hurdles. Most military installations are afforded Internet access. Within the portal families have the ability to send email messages, post pictures from home, record and upload video and audio clips for the troops to access when they have time. Our video conferencing system, which requires no software installation, can be used 24 hours a day seven days a week. There are no restrictions or weeks of preplanning required for access to the system. It is available as the soldier's time permits. For the times between the other services onsite provide for immediate contact through our text chat rooms and private text chat system.

All the services offered on ConnectFriend.com are free to active military, whether deployed abroad or domestically. Non-military users may use the services and their monthly fees go to offset the costs of providing the free military accounts. If you or your family would like to do something to support our troops please consider signing up at ConnectFriend and you will have a value service with video conferencing while helping our troops stay in touch with their families.

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Dad Stays in Touch While On Business

I travel quite a lot for my company. My business takes me to several cities all over the US and having a cell phone is great but being able to see my 5 year old son and wife while we talk is super.

We have tried to use our favorite messenger but some of the hotels and offices that I am in have firewalls to deal with.

I read an article on the internet about connectfriend and thought I’d give it a try. Connectfriend has turned out to be a really convenient service for me and my family because I can post messages for my wife to pick up at her convenience. I carry a laptop with a headset and a laptop Logitech webcamera with built in wireless. At home we have a wireless router, a desktop PC and a laptop set up the same as my company laptop. My wife usually uses the laptop because she can move from room to room or even outside while we talk. I was really surprised at how well the connectfriend video messenger works even on wireless connections. I can hear and see my family in almost real time video.

As an added bonus I am very pleased that the two accounts that I pay for on here enable four free troop accounts. I was one of those guys that wanted to do something to support the troops but hadn’t decided what to do or how to proceed. Connectfriend allows me to have access to a good service while supporting our soldiers.


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My Father's First Internet Video Chat Experience

I got a call from my mother, who lives three thousand miles from me, telling me that my father wasn't doing well after a bout with pneumonia and she needed a little help. I would do anything for my mother and father so I got the house in order and left my husband and son with a refrigerator full of frozen dinners for my parent's house. It isn't really any big deal because we're only five hours apart by air so off I went to help with my father.

When I got there everything was fine and Pop was feeling better, seems I'd rushed out a little prematurely, but it was great to see everyone. I had told my husband that we would call around the same time every day to keep each other updated. On my first call home my husband asked, "doesn't your sister still have her computer?" I told him that yes indeed she still had it and it worked. He then suggested that I download a copy of the "WebPhone" and we could talk over the net instead of using the phone. So I downloaded the software while my husband (my personal tech-support guy) led me through the installation procedure. I had forgotten about the "WebPhone". We used it to talk to my mother-in-law all the time. We got a free trial copy of it when we bought a new sound card for our computer and thought for its day (mid 1990's) it was fantastic. It even had video capabilities over dial-up and it worked surprisingly well. After the install we connected to each other and there were the familiar faces that I missed starring at me in the video window. I could see them very clearly as long as they didn't move too much in the picture. That was quite a feat as my son was 5 at the time. We called my father over and sat him down in front of the computer and he was speechless. He had never seen anything like this before. It wasn't long until he was pacing, waiting for each video call. He was totally awestruck with the video and the idea of being able to see his grandson on a daily basis. A couple of years later the company that provided the Webphone system stopped supporting the software and we had to return to the telephone.

A year ago we found the service offered by ConnectFriend. We were touched by their program to support our troops and decided to sign up and give it a try. With the new higher speed connections and the list of services they provide family users we quickly got all of our family members to sign up on the service. It has been the best for all of us. Everyone uses the service almost every day. I recommend that if you are looking for a way to stay in touch with your family and help support the troops ConnectFriend is definitely worth a try.

In closing I would like to say thank you ConnectFriend for bringing my family closer. You guys have an AWSOME service.

Sincerely,
Name Removed

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