"Mike the unimaginative" <Youremail@nospam.here> wrote in message
news:13o7lroheaghn3c@corp.supernews.com...[color=blue]
> [email]mymail@hotmail.co.uk[/email] wrote in
> news:au17o3dbukadg0a2oss37f7c9p9gnbepen@4ax.com:
>[color=green]
>> On Tue, 08 Jan 2008 01:02:34 GMT, "Homeworker" <novalid@fakeukadd.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>[color=darkred]
>>>are they and landline/mobile calls are so cheap now theres no REAL
>>>saving is there?if yourplanning to keep your exisitng land line and
>>>mobile ?[/color]
>> No saving at all I have 500 free minutes airtime on my mobile and have
>> never come close to the 500 yet .
>> VOIP was just a gimmick to encourage people to spend money on ATA's
>> etc in the first instance and to avoid extortionate BT call charges
>> but now with all the free mobile minutes that are around and services
>> like 18866.com who provide a Geo number to call via mobile there
>> really isn't any need for voip at all .
>>[/color]
> You will be struck down for heresay!
> But.... I fear you are right. For most home users - let me repeat that
> - for Most Home Users - voip is a technology solution looking for a
> question.
> The call charges are not competitive when you look at all the other
> packages available (mobile / landline); the technology is unweildy
> (unless you buy a locked ATA); the call quality can be flaky (unless you
> have the nouce to be able to deal with the hardware).
> I suspect voip's time will come, but it's not now![/color]

I don't know about other users, but for me it IS a question of cost. I am
sure that I could get a similar sort of costing through various override
codes on a standard fixed line + mobile. However I find it a lot easier
(and actually cheaper in my set-up) to get technology to do the hard bit of
least cost routing. Oh and I forgot all the benefits you don't get with
conventional services (call forking conditional divert, ...) or other
services you pay through the nose for (ACR, call blocking).

I agree with you though that the technology is unweildy, and that is a big
factor in what is stopping it becoming mainstream. However the likes of
Tesco and Vonage are the ones that will make it mainstream. Unfortunately
Skype destroys that to some extent (and yes Skype is VOIP, unfortunately)
because people see VOIP as a softphone, with all the restrictions that
gives.

Not quite heresy, but an opinion I don't entirely agree with!