VoIP Tech Chat

Residential VoIP - No Operators

Some say the media sensationalizes our economic woes for their personal gain. Others say the media accurately portrays the extreme financial burdens we find ourselves facing. And some people say, “Hey. I don’t care about anything, I always have and always will try to save money.” With today’s world becoming increasingly digital, VoIP (digital telephone) seems like a naturally good idea.

Clearly, we at VoIP Tech Chat advocate VoIP. We love it. We love it so much, we made a website called VoIP Tech Chat. And we actually now and then have chats and write articles on VoIP (ok, that last part was a little sarcastically since both Patrick and Fred seem to have been too busy to actually talk or write lately… but anyway…).
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Look. Its Kevin Martin of the FCC. Hi Kevin.

The US Congress Committee on Energy and Commerce released a scathing report of the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) under Chairman Kevin Martin. The report, titled “Deception and Distrust: The Federal Communications System Under Chairman Kevin J. Martin” (sounds like a Lifetime movie), harshly criticizes both the FCC and Kevin Martin. Although, from the title alone, you had to have guessed the report wasn’t going to be flattering.

The committee found (among other things):

• FCC Chairman Kevin Martin manipulated, withheld, or suppressed data, reports, and information from other FCC commissioners and Congress.
• Important Commission matters have not been handled in an open and transparent manner; raising suspicions on unfair treatment.
• The Commission has failed to carry out important responsibilities regarding oversight of the Telecommunications Relay Service Fund (allowing customers to be overcharged while companies are overcompensated).
• FCC Chairman Kevin Martin’s “heavy-handed” management style has created distrust, suspicion, and turmoil among the five current Commissioners.
• Commission staff have not been efficiently managed.

The report uses such statements as “classic fleecing of America” (regarding overcharging customers), “undermined the ability of the FCC to accomplish its mission” (describing Martin’s management style), and “Chairman Martin’s manipulation of the Second Report calls into question the reliability of telecommunications information and analysis provided by the FCC to Congress.” Ouch.

The investigation was launched after allegations were received from FCC employees (current and former), other FCC Commissioners, and telecom reps. The Bi-Partisan Congressional committee launched the investigation in January, however did not hold the typically expected hearings “due to the climate of fear that pervades the FCC.” Apparently, witnesses were too scared to publicly testify.

The FCC provides authoritative rule making over VoIP, telecommunications (such as Cable, Wireless Phones, Telephones, POTS, etc.), television, and almost some part of electronic life that we touch daily.

More reading:

• Download the Report (PDF)
• CNET.com: Congressional report: FCC chair abused power
• Associated Press: House report finds leadership breakdown at FCC

Pike & Fischer recently published their Residential VoIP Market Outlook. The reports advises that more than 8.5 million household will start using VoIP within 2 years — bringing the estimated number of US residential VoIP users to 30 million by 2010. Clearly 2010 will be a VoIP odyssey.

Traditional POTS providers such as at&t and Verizon will notice decreasing numbers of residential customers while stand alone VoIP providers (such as Vonage, Packet 8, and voip.com), Cable companies, and wireless providers pick up the slack.

Just when we were going to post the next series of “What is,” Mr. Cory Andrews scoops us with his “Ask Mr. Andrews: What is NAT Transversal?” post. He even made a super cool logo.

Well, we have only 2 comments:

1. No Star Wars or Dungeons & Dragons references?
2. Two Words: Ben Affleck

Seriously, it’s a nice post. And if you liked it, please check out:

• What is a VoIP?
• What is POTS?
• What is DTMF?
• How does 911 work with VoIP?
• and the opinion piece, Mommy, What’s a Phone Cord?

Thomas Hughes, CIO of the Social Security Administration (SSA), gave a nice interview to Nick Walkerman of Washington Technology. The interview provided some insight into the VoIP deployment of the SSA.

For more on the deployment, check out our VoIP Tech Chat article.

Imagine this scenario — You’re the bus driver. At your first stop, half of your passengers get off the bus and none get on. You keep driving and on the next stop, half of the remaining passengers get off, and again, no new passengers get on the bus. At the next stop, the same thing happens. You keep seeing passengers get off the bus, but no one is getting on. Now, what do you do? If you’re at&t, you raise the price of bus service. (For extra credit, who’s the bus driver?)

The Tennessean posted today that at&t is raising the rates of basic phone service and calling features in the hopes of increasing profits. Although basic phone service would increase by “pennies,” other features would see a much more significant increase. For example, Caller ID and Call Forwarding would increase about a dollar and bundle packs would increase about 2 dollars. Oh, and at&t reported a profit of 3.46 billion dollars — in just the first quarter.

So now, you’re a landline service provider. People are dropping landline service for VoIP and Wireless Only plans. You’re making an average of just over a billion dollars a month profit. You want that number to increase. So, you raise rates? Wouldn’t that make people jump ship even more? So, instead of making your services more attractive, you’re going to jack up prices on your loyal customers who are chosing to stay with you despite cheaper alternatives. Nice.

We love this quote:

A spokeswoman for AT&T, Dawn Benton, said the company’s decision to raise rates had nothing to do with the loss of landlines.

“Our focus is to bring greater value to our plans: a unified portfolio, greater consistency and simpler pricing right up front,” she said in a statement. “Even with these changes, we still offer some of the best values and offers in the market today.”

VoIP providers like voip.com, Vonage, and Packet8 bundle residential service and include more features than you’ll ever need. Oh, and most plans include long distance, too. Someone needs to help Dawn Benton find a clue.

About a month ago, Fierce VoIP reported on VoIP quality testing conducted by Keynote Systems. The results proved quite interesting.

Keynote determined (based on testing providers such as Packet8, Vonage, Verizon VoiceWing, Lingo, etc.) that most VoIP users can expect “merely tolerable” telephone service when compared to an at&t POTS line.

One of the VoIP providers tested failed to achieve any calls with an MOS score of 4.0 or better (ouch).

Why did Voip Tech Chat wait more than a month to post this news? Patrick and Fred were too busy talking about Lifelock and Ben Affleck movies. 

Oh, and Asterisk Voip News posted that a cool new IP Phone with a huge video screen is coming soon.

Verizon recently announced new discounts for wireless only customers interested in Internet or television service. Called the “Flex Double Play” bundle, the discount offers a reduction of $8 – $12 a month for people combining Verizon Wireless with broadband or TV services.

Now, remember of course, that Verizon originates from the traditional POTS provider, Bell Atlantic. Back in the 80’s (1983 to be exact), when there was one big phone company called Bell, the US government decided that Americans would benefit from 7 companies instead of 1 big one. The 7 smaller phone companies, or “Baby Bells” were to handle local phone service and allow other companies to handle long distance.

With that historical digression, please remember that Verizon essential developed from this split; therefore sometimes still thinks like a traditional POTS provider.

How so you ask?

Well, the discount sounds great — but the big phone companies just don’t know how to provide something without conditions. If you want the fastest DSL or FiOS plans, you get no discount. The discount will only be offered towards DSL plans of 3 mbps and FiOS plans of 20 mbps.

Still, if you don’t want the best of the best, saving up to $12 a month still adds up to a nice deal. Maybe they should read our Wireless Only article to learn more about Wireless Only customers.

No, we’re not talking about another take on the Black Eyed Peas song (Alanis Morissette’s is our favorite). Instead, we’re talking about a new business service from Packet 8.

Voip Trunking provides a method of connecting POTS equipment or conventional telephone equipment with a Voice over Internet (VoIP) network. Vonage, Voip.com, and Packet8 already ship out phones and adapters (or ATAs) for their residential services. These ATAs are essentially VoIP Trunks.

Many companies already offer Business VoIP service to “any” device. For example, both Voip.com and VoicePulse (along with many other providers) offer a BYOD (bring your own device) business service; allowing a user to connect their current equipment to the provider’s network (Voip.com also provides BYOD residential service). Packet 8 however seems to truly embrace the non-voip office. 

Most other providers require some knowledge or existing experience with integration. BYOD plans basically are geared towards a user who knows what they want and can either integrate the service themselves or hire a consultant for assistance. Here’s where Packet 8’s offering differs. VoIP-News reports that Packet 8 will be including installation of the Trunking service to the customer’s system. Of course, this is not free. With installation costs of $1,500.00 (including the internet voip trunk gateway), it may be cheaper to get a consultant to integrate a different provider.

However, for Packet 8 to sell the installation, device, and connectivity as one package — well, that’s a really good idea for a non-tech savvy office.

News.com (CNET.com for those who kick it old school) posted a great article about privacy, encryption, and security with instant messaging (“How safe is instant messaging? A security and privacy survey“). Not only did CNET.com make a nice, pretty chart of their findings, they actually talked to the most popular IM choices and some of the answers are really intriguing.

Among the many questions asked by CNET.com were:

• Does your service keep server-based logs of the content of communications, meaning what a particular user sent and received?
• Have you ever received a subpoena, court order or other law enforcement request asking you to turn over information about a user’s IM account?
• If so, how many law enforcement requests have you received?
• Have you ever received a subpoena, court order or other law enforcement request asking you to perform a live interception or wiretap, meaning the contents of your users’ communications would be instantly forwarded to law enforcement?

The standard answer to these questions was the ol’ standard that communication with Law Enforcement is not discussed — aka, we fully comply. Skype though gets huge points from us for many reasons.

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