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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With FCC approval, a Sprint-Clearwire merger seems imminent. eWeek reported today of Sprint’s FCC approval; paving the way for the 2 companies to merge.

Clearwire, which has a history of blocking VoIP providers such as Vonage and voip.com, may not have the best reputation for early adopters.

With a history of non-net-neutrality, we would hope that Clearwire (and Sprint) both make active statements about the future of WiMax service with VoIP and the ability to choose your own provider.

We can remember helping troubleshoot many a VoIP issue with Clearwire customers affected by their blocking policies. When asked, “Why would Clearwire block Vonage but offer their own VoIP service?” we would simply say, “because they can.” Although these issues were mostly in the past (2006), we must remember that history is a great predictor.

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.

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.

The AP reported today that MagicJack recently became the fastest-growing phone company in the United States. And we thought that only Fred and Patrick were up at 4am to watch those super, high-quality infomercials.

The parent company, YMax Corp out of Palm Beach, Florida, released sales figures showing 8 – 9000 sales per day. The MagicJack device sells for just under 40 dollars and includes a year of free calls within the United States and Canada. An additional year of phone “service” costs an additional $19.95.

Why put service in quotes? Right now, you are unable to transfer your existing number to magicjack; and according to their website, there will be a nominal fee when LNP becomes available.

With a device that requires connection to your home computer to both make and receive phone calls, this service truly has differences with “traditional” VoIP telephone providers such as Vonage, Voip.com, and Packet8. But, at $40 for a year of service, will anyone care? If you care to read more, Michael Graves has a nice little post about Magic Jack on his blog.

Let’s play the pyramid game. You remember the Pyramid, no? One of Dick Clark’s best game shows, hands down. Plus, anytime you pair stars with average Joe’s — well, let’s just say Foundation for Excellence. So, enough introduction, let’s play pyramid.

F.W. Woolworth Company. Apple. Walgreens pharmacy. 

• Stores with agricultural names? (buzzer)
• Stores with automatic doors? (buzzer)
• Industry leaders who have since fallen from the top of their industry or floundered like fish at a deli? (ding ding ding)

Woolworth’s

F.W. Woolworth Company, or Woolworth’s, originated the entire five and dime concept. How big was Woolworth’s? The owner (interestingly enough named Mr. Woolworth), bought prime land in New York City and built the tallest building in the world. Oh yeah, the entire project — paid for in cash. We can’t even pay cash for a decent SUV; how sad is that. Anyway, Woolworth plowed itself into America (get it? America farmland? Plow? Oh well…) becoming one of the largest retail chains in the world. Read the rest of this entry »

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.

If you are reading this article thinking that we’ll discuss cookware or the latest Rachel Ray recipe, you’ve come to the wrong place. At VoIP Tech Chat our mission is simple — we’re here to chat about VoIP. Think of it as Coffee Talk, without the coffee or infatuation with Barbara.

Sometimes, to discuss VoIP, we must discuss what VoIP is not — in this case, VoIP is not POTS.

POTS is the common nickname and acronym for Plain Old Telephone Service – you know, the “traditional” phone jack in your wall. The POTS system uses technology that is basically unchanged since the early 1900’s. The wires may be upgraded, sure there’s more features, but the telephone technology in use via POTS is essentially the same technology introduced before there were airplanes, highways, or even household refrigerators.

Background, aka Trivial Knowledge that Patrick would call Interesting

The telephone was invented by Alexander Graham Bell, who along with Thomas Edison, created a method of transferring voice over long distance through the use of connecting wires. Basically, one telephone would be physically connected to another.

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