California Demands Licensure For VoIP Providers

muonzoo writes "Looks like California will be wrangling up the VoIP companies and mowing them down. Or, at least licensing them. CNET has a story about state legislators' push for all VoIP companies in the state to carry a Telephone Operator License. CNET also has a quick blurb about Vonage and how they have recently started charging customers a 'Regulatory Recovery Fee.' Ugly stuff for a young industry." Here's our earlier post about Vonage charging the regulatory recovery fee.

Comments

Here's a link

[Sir Haxalot]

to the same story on ZDNet.

Re:Here's a link

[Anonymous Coward]

"and thats why we dont let Airline companies build airports."

So true. Sigh.

Re:Here's a link

[gardel]

Here's a better link to a much more complete story (that CNET clearly followed):

http://www.voxilla.com/Article25-nested-order0-t hr eshold0.phtml

Operator license = fees and taxes

[r_glen]

Yet another not-so-subtle attempt at increasing state revenue.
Stay away from my internet, dammit!

Re:Operator license = fees and taxes

[PerlGuru]

I'm a vonage user and recently (a week ago, or the week before) received am email message indicating that they were lowering thier rates by $5, which they did. Vonage seems like a great company to me. I had difficulties getting ahold of support when we first went with them (about a year ago) but they have grown now. I haven't, however needd to call support since then.

Re:Operator license = fees and taxes

[NanoGator]

"Yet another not-so-subtle attempt at increasing state revenue."

There was a story on the news last night that another big company is leaving Portland (OR) to move to Nashville citing that it's more business friendly. That basically translates as "lower taxes". Other companies here have moved up to Vancouver WA, about 10 miles north. So, in effect, Portland's rising taxes are pushing the businesses that support the economy aay.

You know, I watched Arnie talk a little bit about California, and he made a point that the solution is to cut the spending, not raise the taxes.

Gotta say, if I were in Cali, I'd be paying a lot of attention to that guy. At the very least, I hope he creates ripples over here.

Re:Operator license = fees and taxes

[interiot]

Even played SimCity? Those are the main two influences... lower taxes leads less government revenue per tax payer... higher taxes leads to less taxpayers. If you're seeking to maximize government revenue, SOME taxpayers moving away is acceptable, as long as you're still on the left side of the curve heading up (or raising taxes briefly and then lowering them before taxpayers get motivated enough to move away). -Dave

Re:Operator license = fees and taxes

[Anonymous Coward]

Arnold's new political message: I own at SimCity! Elect Schwarzenneger

Internal VoIP Included?

[nurb432]

What if i do VoIP totally inside my company. does this sort of garbage effect me as well?

what about software suppliers.. ( both commercial and OSS )

etc etc.

( and no i didnt read it.. link didnt come up here )

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[Quarters]

Do you have to pay any telephone operator regulatory charges now?

Do you sell your VoIP services to end users?

If you answered yes to either/both of those, then you probably are affected. If you're not a VoIP provider then I doubt you have anything to worry about.

I don't see this as as big a deal as the submittor of the article does. If a company is a telephone provider, regardless of the trasmission mechanism used, then they should have to play using the same set of rules/regulations as the other telephone providers.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[JVert]

What about msn voice chat?

What about when msn voice works on smartphones?

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[0x0d0a]

Exactly. This is unenforceable and stupid, made by folks trying to adapt old-media rules to the Internet to keep old business models afloat. You *cannot* sanely enforce this -- if you want to do something equivalent but reasonable, your only option is a tax on Internet data as a whole.

*God*, I hate people trying to legislate the Internet. I wish I had a list of "good" tech politicians (the EFF oughta provide this) to support. That Rick what's-his-name from Virginia that keeps hitting Slashdot seems to have pretty pro-tech views, for instance.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[Kevitt]

If a company is a telephone provider, regardless of the trasmission mechanism used, then they should have to play using the same set of rules/regulations as the other telephone providers

Why? No, really, I'd like to know why. Just because the bits traveling over the wires can be regrouped and transformed into speech that a human can understand, why does that require oversight, licenses, or fees? Why does it require regulation at all?

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[bs_02_06_02]

You don't see how this is a problem?
The problem is this: The government won't quit there. Soon, they'll tax everything. They'll tax your computer as a receiver and a transmitter, access charges to the "network", they'll have "per call charges", and mileage or time charges.
The next group of legislators will want to "improve" on something in the past. It always happens. Shortly, we'll be paying "email" tax.
This is just a first attempt at a small segment of the market. No one will complain because no one really likes the phone companies, and no matter what, most people will always see these companies as just another phone company.

There are legislators out there that actually think they are "smart" over this one. They really, truly believe that they're doing "us" a favor on this one. I don't see it that way. They are limiting who can offer service, and ultimately, they're limiting the price too.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[DrMorpheus]

Why? No, really, I'd like to know why. Just because the bits traveling over the wires can be regrouped and transformed into speech that a human can understand, why does that require oversight, licenses, or fees? Why does it require regulation at all?

[sigh]

Why charge semis a fee that travel the same road as cars which don't get charged those same fees? Different use of the same road, just like different data traveling over the same wire being treated differently.
Let's face it, critics of this simply want government services for free. They don't want to pay any taxes at all, but they do want the services that (local, state, federal) governments provide.

Here's an analogous situation:

Just because the bits traveling over the wires can be regrouped and transformed into a financial transaction that an accountant can understand, why does that require a fee when I use an ATM?

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[M$ Mole]

This is exactly right. I work for a police deptartment...how do you think the state funds 911 Emergency Services? Taxes on phones. Look at the bottom of your phone bill fellow Californians, there's a tax notice there that goes to supporting your emergency services.

If someone is acting as a PROVIDER of phone services, then the tax needs to apply to them.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the bank owns it and charges you a fee dumbass. Talk about your horrible analogy.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[darrin60]

Don't confuse computer to computer VOIP as what the state governments have chosen to regulate. They are only going to regulate VOIP where it interfaces with the PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network). This interconnection is what differentiates your voice chat computer programs from what what companies like Vonage do. All service providers who interconnect with the PSTN are regulated.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[Lemmeoutada Collecti]

Ah, but the local 911 will not allow VoIP to connect into their network, and as a taxpayer, I do not see paying for a service I am denied the ability to use.

Re:Internal VoIP Included?

[Dun Malg]

Do you have to pay any telephone operator regulatory charges now? Do you sell your VoIP services to end users?

If you answered yes to either/both of those, then you probably are affected. If a company is a telephone provider, regardless of the trasmission mechanism used, then they should have to play using the same set of rules/regulations as the other telephone providers.

The problem is, the defenition of "telephone provider" gets pretty fuzzy in this area. I could, for example, own a 10-story building and equip it with a used AT&T switch fed by a couple T1's and reserve a block of, say, 250 Direct In-Dial numbers. Then I could provide service to my tenants by issuing them a number from the DID pool switched in and out through those T1's and charge them monthly for it. It's essentially the same as having a PBX-type phone system. I'd basically be taxed on those 48 lines the two T1's represent, not the 250 phone numbers I have reserved. Why? Because I'm never going to be using more than 48 lines worth of capacity at any one time. The 250 numbers are simply addressing, not service. So with VOIP, you're doing the same thing, only rather than selling it in one building, you're selling it everywhere and delivering it via the internet. Essentially, it could be argued that VOIP is the equivalent of selling access to one of the extensions on the company's telephone system. Companies don't pay tax based on the number of extensions on their system, so why should VOIP providers?

Bullshit

[eln]

Just because VoIP involves voice, that does NOT mean it's the same as telephone service. The monopolistic nature of telephone service (only one company can realistically have lines in a given area, particularly in the "last mile") makes heavy regulation and regulatory fees necessary. VoIP does not suffer from this physical limitation to competition, and thus any number of VoIP providers can exist in any area. This is yet another blatant attempt of government to cash in on an emerging technology.

Re:Bullshit

[Quarters]

And how is that VoIP transmission getting into your house? I'd assume it's on those same cables that cause the physical limitation to competition you are talking about.

If the VoIP transmission is coming across a telephone or cable company's lines I can see why they would want the VoIP companies to have to play by the same rules.

Re:Bullshit

[drakaan]

Are you saying he's not already paying a phone company that's charging him regulatory fees for the lines you mentioned? the VOIP companies are already paying charges for the physical lines/numbers that *they* use. Now you're going to make them pay for the same lines that the customer's local phone company is already paying for. I'm gonna have to side with the original poster, and call bullshit. If you can prove that the phone company can't provide the same service, then I'll consider your opinion.

Re:Bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

looking outside I see one phone line and one cable line serving my neighborhood. looks to me like they still own "the last mile."

Re:Bullshit

[Shalda]

I'll have to disagree with you here. The issue, as many states now seem to see it, is that at some point VoIP no longer travels over IP. A call originating on IP eventually meets up with the Plain Old Telephone System, wherein any number of regulations apply. The government is not trying to "cash in", they're trying to make everyone play by the same rules. That's pretty much what government does or mostly should. As a libertarian, I think it's appropriate that Vonage be held to the same standards (and fees) as everyone else. Of course, as a libertarian, I also think most of those standards and fees shouldn't exist in the first place, but that's a fight for another day.

Now, there is an argument to be made for the fact that Vonage can't actually verify the physical location of a caller. However, they are using California area codes and California billing addresses, so it's pretty realistic to mandate a California telephone operator's license. As for fees, there's also an argument that there maybe ought to be a different schedule since they're not using traditional land lines. However, I suspect this is an issue cellular providers have long since addressed.

Re:Bullshit

[reinard]

Yes, the same lines that are already regulated, and that I'm already paying about 20 different taxes on. Why do you think it makes sense to take a service that's superimposed on that and tax (and regulate) it again? Are you going to agree with 'virtual stamps' for emails next? After all, they are doing the same thing as the postal office - right?

The much bigger issue is that just because something is VoIP, does in no way whatsoever mean that it's equivalent to a phone line. If the VoIP company used a wireless connection to your house in a public frequency range to provide a service that is equivalent to a phone line, you may have a point. Short of that, this is over-regulation and double taxation, and will by all means stifle an emerging technology.

Re:Bullshit

[joab_son_of_zeruiah]

Government legislators are too stupid. I think if you look behind the scenes, you'll find a vast lobby of exiting telcos, manufacturers, etc, -- those already vested in the telecom industry.

Unfortunatly, VoIP is not just a lot of "young companies" innovating. It's just another "pure-play Internet" idea meeting the force of reality.

Re:Bullshit

[crayiii]

My broadband come into my home wirelessly. There are no phone or cable (TV) lines live at my house.

Re:Bullshit

[gmcclel]

However, they are using California area codes and California billing addresses, so it's pretty realistic to mandate a California telephone operator's license.

Hmmm. Given the expansion of long-distance included cellular, VoIP, and POTS services, seems like a web site with a break-down of state regulated charges would be a useful resource. Since Vonage lets me pick a phone number anywhere, I'd expect them to only pass along the regulatory fees from the state where the number 'resides'. I'll just pick the state with the lowest charges.

Re:Bullshit

[blitziod]

that argument makes since BUT who has VIOP in a home that is piped in without paying ta on the line? Maybe via sat links..but most pay for a DSL line and pay tax on that line or pay for a cable line and pay tax on that .

Re:Bullshit

[Lodragandraoidh]

You can run VOIP on a data only network - you don't have to have a PSTN gateway.

I would think that 'data-only' VOIP services would be exempt - otherwise it would open up all data networks to regulation. The internet would be regulated.

That would be a very bad thing...

Costs to maintain the records and functions of the regulations within the service providers would cut into profits.

As a result services that are borderline or non- profitable would be cut, people would be layed off, and many providers would probably get out of VOIP altogether. This would not benefit the public in any way - just the incumbent large service providers who could pay the regulatory 'bills' and then reap the longterm windfall of the former customers of the borderline operations.

Re:Bullshit

[Anonymous Coward]

Virtual stamps for emails would be okay if they only cost about 0.01 cents each. That way the only people who were seriuously impacted would be spammers.

Re:Bullshit

[mjh]

A call originating on IP eventually meets up with the Plain Old Telephone System, wherein any number of regulations apply.

Correct. And the line(s) that connect VoIP to the PSTN are already regulated and taxed. Why should it be taxed twice when shared access to the line is resold to me?

Or think of it this way. My company has a PBX. My company pays the regulatory fees and taxes on the T1 that gets piped into the PBX. They then turn around and run lines out of the PBX to all of our desks. Should my company be paying taxes on all of the lines that they run to all of the desks? If not, why is this situation any different than VoIP?

Re:Bullshit

[iabervon]

The issue is that Vonage (et al) actually give you a telephone number and let you make telephone system calls. The VoIP step is irrelevant there; the issue is that you're making and receiving regular phone calls in Vonage's office, which then connects to you over the internet. It doesn't matter if you go to the phone company building to make your calls, have a long phone cord to your home, or connect over the internet. There's still a phone circuit there with your number on it, and the company still does telephony.

If governments start bothering pure VoIP companies (where the voice only goes over IP and you have nothing to do with the phone network), that would be a different matter. But that doesn't seem to be happening currently, and probably won't, because what's far more likely is that there won't be a services company doing that; it'll be peer-to-peer sound managing software and a directory service (or maybe it will just use DNS, like email does).

On the other hand, things like the operator and 911 are tied to the phone network and probably won't move to VoIP any time soon. It's these sorts of things that telephone regulation funds and that the phone network provides reliable access to.

Re:Bullshit

[Nerdy]

Exactly. In most cases if not all the call has to at somepoint hit the POTS network and should be held to the same regulations as the regular phone companies.

Regulate them like cell phone companies.

Re:Bullshit

[muckdog]

It would also heavily affect the nice people that run email list servers like CERT.

Re:Bullshit

[Wesley Felter]

The monopolistic nature of telephone service ... makes heavy regulation and regulatory fees necessary.

Cellular carriers and CLECs are also regulated, even though they are not monopolies; this seems to invalidate your theory.

Re:Bullshit

[plague3106]

And how is that VoIP transmission getting into your house? I'd assume it's on those same cables that cause the physical limitation to competition you are talking about.

If the VoIP transmission is coming across a telephone or cable company's lines I can see why they would want the VoIP companies to have to play by the same rules.

You're already paying for it. If you have DSL, you're paying for it fairly directly. If you have cable, you're paying for it indirectly (the cable co. pays the phone co. to hang wires on its polls. Even if thats not the case, the CABLE company owns the wire you're sending vioce over with VoIP...don't see where the local telco comes in at all.). Either way, the wire is ALREADY paid for.

Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[warpSpeed]

When Arrrnold gets in office, this will all get taken care of :-)

*ducks, and runs for life...*

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[NightSpots]

With any luck, your off-hand joke will be reality.

California doesn't need any more taxes, we need to cut spending. That isn't going to happen with Davis, et al in power. Arnold or McClintock are the only ones who have expressed any interest in cutting spending.

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[Yohahn]

If you believe that, I've got some swampland in Florida that I want to sell ya.

No, really!!

Who makes the laws in California?
How is being the executive going to reduce programs?

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[hrieke]

Completely off topic here, but how do you think either person, or if it matters, anyone who wins the office will deal with California's public inititivies (teacher / student ratios, emmissons limits, etc.) and cut spending at the same time?

Then again, I guess we really don't need street cleaning, road repair, weights and messurements, law enforcement, fire fighters, libraries, forests and parks, schools, public health, street lights, farm aid, social nets, or anything else to help the people, just as long as the taxes are low.

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[warpSpeed]

The Executive branch may not "make" the laws, but the Govoner still has to sign the laws or veto them.

If you think that the govonor is without influence over the legislative branch and cannot exert some power over the regulators office, you should stay in the real estate buisness in Florida, politics is not for you.

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[Master Bait]

Details, details. Those details don't really matter -- do they? Seriously, not many voters seem to notice that the state is required to spend 49% of it's budget on schools. The state is required to provide medical support to some by federal mandate. Welfare, too. Today, there isn't enough discretionary spending left in the entire state budget to eliminate this year's fiscal debt.

People seem to like the idea that they get services and don't have to pay for them. Neocon ARNOLD gets a free ride over his Big Lie from Big Media because that's the industry he serves.

McClintock is honest, but the reality is that nobody except a millionaire wants to give up all those services in exchange for lower taxes.

California is very, very weird. It takes a simple majority to approve spending money, but it takes a two-third's majority to approve raising revenue.

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[sharkey]

When Arrrnold gets in office

I thought Talk Like a Pirate Day was over.

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[nyseal]

But at least he may bring the waste to the taxpayer's eye; that's the first step. Where do you think it'll go from there?

Re:Just wait for the Taxinator to get in office...

[Yohahn]

If you think that he's really going to cut taxes and programs and solve the budget problem,
come visit my real estate business.

You'll be wanting to work after you leave your political carrer.

Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[NightSpots]

This is quite indicative of the business environment in california, and a perfect example of why the recall is (1) going forward, and (2) going to replace Davis with a Republican who's not afraid to protect business.

6 more days til the vote.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[Tim]

"This is quite indicative of the business environment in california, and a perfect example of why the recall is (1) going forward, and (2) going to replace Davis with a Republican who's not afraid to protect business."

You know, you're absolutely right. With a Republican in office, California will finally be able to support some successful businesses and leap forward into the modern age! I can hardly wait!

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[driftingwalrus]

Someone who's not afraid to *protect* business? Good god man, have you any idea what you're saying?! The DMCA was passed to protect business! Every copyright term extension has been to protect business! I say business has enough protection - what about protecting people for once? How about the people of Bhupal, India? Dow(who bought out the old Union Carbide plant) seems pretty well protected, but who's protecting the people who have to deal every day with a toxic landmine?

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[PainKilleR-CE]

Someone who's not afraid to *protect* business? Good god man, have you any idea what you're saying?! The DMCA was passed to protect business! Every copyright term extension has been to protect business! I say business has enough protection - what about protecting people for once?

It's not so much about protecting business as protecting jobs. 18 months ago I had the choice of leaving California or changing jobs (though within the same company). I took the $7K raise and relocation rather than the travel-heavy job that would have kept me in California, and kept my tax money in California (and I pay much less in taxes now). While my tax money may not be important to California, it becomes important when you consider that I wasn't alone, that there have been hundreds of people leaving the state in the last couple of years, either because their company pulled out of the state or because they needed to get away from that tax overhead. The company I work for also closed the office I worked in, reducing their overhead in the area (having most of the people work out of their homes or in another local office when they needed an office space).

My parents' vehicle taxes (registration) also tripled this year, in part due to the expiration of an earlier bill that cut them in half, and in part due to Davis & co. approving an increase in them during the same year. This may not sound like a big deal, but the registration on just one of the vehicles (the most expensive and newest vehicle) was just shy of $1,000.

I suppose when California collects more money in taxes from a pack of cigarettes than the company that actually put that pack on the shelves it's protecting people from the evils of smoking. Perhaps the increases in vehicle registration and gas taxes are protecting people from smog (just like lifting the requirement to smog-check vehicles that are less than 4 years old and increasing the cost of smog checks by enacting new rules which require new equipment). Making it illegal to smoke in enclosed public spaces is certainly protecting the public, as every bar owner that's losing business to some bar that has a patio can attest to. Oh, yeah, and there's that new one where Davis wants to require new exhaust restrictions on landscaping equipment, raising the cost of the equipment by ~$45 per item (even for something as simple as a chainsaw or lawnmower which you might be able to get for $50-100 today), even though federal guidelines forbid those regulations.

Don't worry, though, California's got extra bonuses for welfare recipients and illegal aliens, and now that the illegal residents of California can get driver's licenses, they have everything they need to register to vote for the people that gave them those licenses. After all, it may be illegal for them to live in California, and it may be illegal for an illegal immigrant to vote, but all you need to vote in California is a driver's license.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[xlv]

Don't worry, though, California's got extra bonuses for welfare recipients and illegal aliens, and now that the illegal residents of California can get driver's licenses, they have everything they need to register to vote for the people that gave them those licenses. After all, it may be illegal for them to live in California, and it may be illegal for an illegal immigrant to vote, but all you need to vote in California is a driver's license.

Why do people keep using the "register to vote" excuse to be against driver licenses for illegal immigrants? On this forum, people should be smarter and suggest to fix the real problem, the document requirements for voter registration.

For full disclosure, I'm not a US citizen but I have had a CA driver's license for 10 years but I know it's illegal for me to register to vote. Are you suggesting I should give up my CA license and drive whithout a license or insurance because of the posibility somebody in my position registers to vote illegally???

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[xlv]

extra disclosure before the possible flame war, I am a legal CA resident.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[Crash Culligan]

driftingwalrus beat me to the thought:

Someone who's not afraid to *protect* business? Good god man, have you any idea what you're saying?! The DMCA was passed to protect business! Every copyright term extension has been to protect business! I say business has enough protection - what about protecting people for once?

I couldn't agree more with this sentiment. The thing that confuses lots of people is that there are all kinds of "protection" and things they're being protected from (or a different way to think about it, at the expense of).

Take tariffs, for instance. They are government-sanctioned protections for native industries (and in some rare cases, consumers). What are they being protected from? Foreign industries. Consumers occasionally benefit from this protection by being shielded from inferior goods. This is traditional protectionism.

Taxation in general is an attempt to protect the government (or at least what shreds of fiscal solvency it has left) at the expense of the people and business. Of late we've been seeing a lot more protectionism, and much worse varieties of it at that. The DMCA was intended to be a protection for content providers against "pirates and hackers." However, that legislation has done more to hurt consumers, limit their choices, and create dozens of little monopolies, from inkjet cartridges (manufacturers' attempts to lock people into *their* brand by introducing DMCA-worthy measures to guard against "cheap replacements") to music (intentionally broken CDs designed to play only on certain devices) to ...who knows what's next?

Businesses have managed to wheedle protections against their own customers out of the government. Meanwhile, "consumer advocacy" seems to be more or less dead in the water because consumers don't have much of a lobby in Washington.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[PainKilleR-CE]

Why do people keep using the "register to vote" excuse to be against driver licenses for illegal immigrants? On this forum, people should be smarter and suggest to fix the real problem, the document requirements for voter registration.

For full disclosure, I'm not a US citizen but I have had a CA driver's license for 10 years but I know it's illegal for me to register to vote. Are you suggesting I should give up my CA license and drive whithout a license or insurance because of the posibility somebody in my position registers to vote illegally?

The legal immigrant part makes all the difference in the world in terms of the whole licensing issue. As far as registering to vote, I agree, there should be better requirements, or the license should indicate immigration/citizenship status to help the voter registration process. When I lived in California, I registered to vote as part of my application for a California ID (I didn't have a driver's license until I was 20, because of the whole insurance requirement and the fact that I did not have a car).

In reality, I could not possibly understand the reason that anyone would allow illegal immigrants to have a driver's license until I realized that this problem with voter registration existed. Because I needed a birth certificate and proof of residence to get my license, it didn't really occur to me at that time that the license was all I needed to register to vote. The simple fact is that if an illegal immigrant shows up to register for a driver's license, they should be exported, not given a license.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[Anonymous Coward]

they should be exported, not given a license

Yes, we certainly do have a surplus of illegal immigrants... ;)

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[Wateshay]

I don't believe he suggested that there should be blanket protection of business for whatever they may want to do. It's a simple fact that the less business you have in the state, the fewer jobs there are, and therefore the higher your unemployment is. So, there needs to be a balance between protecting business and protecting individuals. At the moment, California has swung way too far to the left and as a result businesses (and by extension, jobs) are fleeing the state in droves. You can't force the businesses to stay, and going further left isn't going to solve the problem. Whether or not Arnold will go too far right remains to be seen (unlikely, since he still has to deal with a left leaning legislature--and probably will for his entire term in office), but Davis and/or Bustamanti(sp?) are certainly not going to turn things around.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[nyseal]

I believe the phrase was 'business'; not 'ALL business'.

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[geekoid]

the reason the recall is going forward has to do with the distaste left over from how the power companies abused there position, left people without power, and Davis just let it happen.

Republicans protect established industries, usually large ones. Who do you think will get protection, the VoIP companies, or the large established telepone monopoly?

Re:Indicative of the business environment in Cal.

[PainKilleR-CE]

oops ;) Now that I've had a good laugh at my own expense, I can't seem to remember the word I should've used there. Ooh yeah, deported ;)

Makes sense to me.....

[Kenja]

Why shouldn't VOIP providers be required by law to follow the same rules as traditional phone serve companies? These rules (amongst other things) protect the consumer from fraud, illegal wire taps and ensures a degree of privacy.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[edstromp]

Because the laws and such were originally defined with the understanding that there would be a monopoly on telephone services (or at least the line into your house).

That is no longer the case. Especially with the internet, as you can get a connection by cable, dsl, satelite, wi-fi, fm, etc... It's a free market. Regulation (at least in this sense) is no longer necessary.

And becides does it make sense to charge a company in NJ for this? All they have are customers in other states. They don't own any property or goods outside of their centraly located servers... which don't reside in your state.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[smackjer]

How do extra taxes/fees protect us from wiretaps and fraud, and ensure any privacy?

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[DEBEDb]

protect the consumer from fraud, illegal wire taps

Ah, they protect people from Herr Ashcroft and
company? Well, then, I, for one, welcome our
new licensing overlords.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[Anonymous Coward]

VoIP in the form in which it is used today is an interim solution. The transformation from voice into IP packets will move into consumer electronics, at which point VoIP is exactly the same as anything else over IP, network-wise. Users will be able to tunnel it through VPNs. In general, there is no reason why this kind of data should be any more fraud-free, private and untapped than other data. If there is need for regulation, it should apply to all network operators, not just telephone companies.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[lobsterGun]

Why shouldn't VOIP providers be required by law to follow the same rules as traditional phone serve companies?

\How about, beacuse I (as a person who pays to have a DSL line run to my house) already conform to the existing telephony regulations and pay all taxes and fees. By regulating and taxing my VOIP service I'm doubly regulated and doubly taxed.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[Anonymous Coward]

because they ain't the same technology and / or service .. DUH!

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[bizcoach]

Why shouldn't VOIP providers be required by law to follow the same rules as traditional phone serve companies?

The problem is that these legislators want to apply a telephone operator licences thing that was designed for a now-past era when telephone companies had natural monopolies.

They should make some new rules which make sense for companies which make a buck from offering some kind of communication service via the internet, and then apply the same tule also to traditional telephone companies - there's no reason why companies which use some particular style of technology should be discriminated against.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[warpSpeed]

What makes you so sure that the VoIP providers are not providing these protections already? It is not in thier interest to have customers be victims of fraud.

They should not have to follow the same rules as the telcos, because they are not telcos. They do not have a fixed cable plant to maintain, nor do they have a monopoly on the local market. They also are not promising 100% uptime either. They are proving you with a _portable_ internet service that lets you take your phone number with you that is not dependant on the local telco.

The VoIP providers are providing a competative service to consumers via an new service delivery route that is not dependant on a single supplier for thier infrastruture. And more power to them!

What you are seeing is (for lack of a better word) innovation at its best. These providers are being creative in bringing you a service. Why start to tax them to death before they can even get going.

How long until they start taxing your web surfing traffic? What is the difference between one data packet and another?

It is a half assed tax.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[0x0d0a]

Exactly. There's no need to deal with phone lines, with monopolies, connections, etc.

The laws in place were put in place to avoid consumer getting screwed. Today, we need laws *not* being added to squash new VoIP companies to avoid consumers getting screwed.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[Lord MJ]

Because VOIP is an APPLICATION, it uses an Application layer protocol. The fact that that protocol allows one to transmit voice over the internet is totally irrelevant. Taxing VOIP would be no different than taxing http.

Re:Makes sense to me.....

[calidoscope]

And [sic]becides does it make sense to charge a company in NJ for this? All they have are customers in other states. They don't own any property or goods outside of their centraly located servers... which don't reside in your state.

Your argument would make sense if I got a NJ phone number with a VoIP account even though I was located in CA. Bet people would love calling me from CA.

If I get a CA number with my VoIP account, then my VoIP provider is acting as a CA phone company. Their servers may not be in CA, but with the CA phone numbers they have a CA presence, and thus their exposure to CA regulation.

Software-only

[interiot]

Are software-only VoIP providers required to pay also? The article is a little light on the details. This is clearly the first step for charging extra for specific kinds of data that differ by nothing other than what they're used for.

i just don't get it

[mantera]

why is regulation necessary?

Re:i just don't get it

[NightSpots]

It's not necessary.

It's an attempt to get money without needing 2/3 of the vote.

In california, Democrats hold about 60% of the state assembly, which means they need 3 or 4 republicans to vote for a 'tax' increase. But, if you call it regulation, you need only a simple majority, which they have easily. It's entirely designed to raise revenues, has nothing to do with regulating anything.

Re:i just don't get it

[N7DR]

why is regulation necessary?

It isn't, if you don't mind calls that don't have guaranteed quality, calls that are insecure, calls that may be tapped, no guarantee that you can port your number to another service, no guarantee that a 911 call will go through, no ability for a 911 dispatcher to determine your location, no ability for the operator to break into your call when someone needs to reach urgently, etc., etc., etc.

While we slashdot-type people can make a reasonable decision as to whether we really want all this stuff (and hence can decide rationally whether to pay for it), is it really likely that the typical consumer is really going to understand that this service is different from a regular landline telephone? After all, with some of these services, he's going to be using the same telephone that he's been using for years -- so he's going to expect it to work the same.

Yes, I hate regulation too. But if this stuff is going to be marketed as a replacement for regular telephone service, then it had better provide what the typical consumer expectes from his telco. (On the other hand, if it's marketed clearly just as a kind of "don't you dare depend on this for anything; I'm just pretending to be a telephone but I'm not one really" service, then you're right: it shouldn't be regulated.)

Re:i just don't get it

[drakaan]

Well, it's not clearly marketed as something other than a phone service("Vonage: The Broadband Phone Company"), but the TOS (which nobody will read) says:

1.10 Service Distinctions You acknowledge and understand that the Service is not a telephone service. Important distinctions exist between telephone service and the enhanced Service offering provided by Vonage. The Service is subject to different regulatory treatment than phone service. This treatment may limit or otherwise affect your rights of redress before Federal and State telecommunications regulatory agencies.

There *is* a 911 service, and there is a method for a 911 dispatcher to determine your location, but you must explicitly set this up (it's a free, optional service). As for normal POTS line overrides, etc, I don't see any mention, other than section 1.10 of the TOS.

If you mind low-qality, insecure, tappable calls, you probably don't own a cell phone, and if you don't own a cell phone, this service likely won't be one you'd buy (IMHO).

Re:i just don't get it

[N7DR]

There *is* a 911 service

Is there a guarantee that the 911 call will go to the correct dispatch center, and, more obscurely, is there a guarantee that the 911 call will complete even if the network is already operating at capacity with non-911 calls?

Maybe there is (I've never looked at Vonage's offering in any detail), but knowing how hard it would be to make good on the latter requirement, I strongly doubt it.

The whole CALEA issue is pretty interesting too. In fact, almost everything to do with VoIP is interesting. But then, I do this stuff for a living, so I guess that it's good that I find it so.

I was waiting for someone to bring up the comparison with cellular "service" :-) But I'm going to choose not to go there :-)

Voice IM?

[moehoward]

What about things like Voice IM? The standards for defining telephony are pretty loose. I talk to people (video conference, voice chat...) over IM all the time via Yahoo and Windows Messenger.

Seems odd to single it out because the lines already exist. I thought that the phone companies were regulated in large part because of the necessity of having only one line per house, rather than 20 providers digging up your town.

Don't most people already pay these access charges in one way or another via ISPs or other downstream providers.

I suspect that the politicians are much more stupid than we assumed. And I mean that.

Re:Voice IM?

[gl4ss]

.. afaik/iwts(i would think so) the line is drawn when the user can access 'normal' phone service from the voip service(of course, if you weren't doing that wtf do you need the voip company for anyways).

which kinda makes it logical for them to be under the same taxation as normal phone companies, otherwise normal phone companies could just replace one part of the line with transparent to the user voip and claim it's a voip service and ditch the taxes too(hint, afaik most phone companies already route phone calls as ip traffic of some kind).

so, 'taxation is bad for young industry' and all that blabla, it's not really a young business.. just new companies doing old business. one could argue though that there's no need for such taxation on voice-over-anything-connecting-the-phone-system (but then again, the money has to come from somewhere.. if you're not intrested in bankrupting the state and fucking up everything).

i don't have much use for voip service anyways.. and i'd think there's not too much takers for it around here anyways(everybody has a cellular phone, and if you really do shitload of talking to just a few people there's gsm operator billing plans to do that very cheaply)

Re:Voice IM?

[argmanah]

Seems odd to single it out because the lines already exist. I thought that the phone companies were regulated in large part because of the necessity of having only one line per house, rather than 20 providers digging up your town.

Don't most people already pay these access charges in one way or another via ISPs or other downstream providers.

I suspect that the politicians are much more stupid than we assumed. And I mean that.

They aren't stupid, they are just trying to wrangle as much for themeselves as they can out of new technologies.

What they fail to realize is that this is the Internet age. The location of a company hardly matters any more. If Yahoo chooses to spin off their VoIP division and move it to Arizona as a subsidiary, the end user wouldn't even notice.

Being the first state to tax something Internet related is a great way to drive businesses out of your state.

Re:Voice IM?

[Mantorp]

I started using Skype last week, the sound quality in my experience blows the Voice IM clients away. They claim to be developing a way of calling regular phones as well.

Re:Voice IM?

[Anonymous Coward]

They aren't stupid, they are just trying to wrangle as much for themeselves as they can out of new technologies.

I assume your smarter than this. What you REALLY meant to say was 'they are just trying to wrangs as much for THE STATE as they can', after all they see none of the money that this generates in their own pockets, which your statement would seem to imply.

Re:Voice IM?

[swordboy]

What about things like Voice IM?

Here's what will eventually happen (IMHO):

VoIP will be taxed by the states but, because it is fundamentally cheaper to maintain, PSTN will die and everyone will eventually find themselves talking via VoIP. Once this happens, you no longer need a "provider" for voice service because you won't need a regular phone number.

You'll be able to contact anyone in the world via their SIP address. Since you will only need an internet connection to maintain a legacy-free SIP address, there will be no way for the states to tax this unless they simply start assessing a general purpose internet tax.

The phone number is what the state is taxing.

It's about tax revenue

[dnotj]

Not about the technology. Here, take more of my money, my kids don't need to eat so much crap from McDonald's anyway. I'm waiting for the "fat tax". Can it be that far off?

Re:It's about tax revenue

[The Lynxpro]

Not about the technology. Here, take more of my money, my kids don't need to eat so much crap from McDonald's anyway. I'm waiting for the "fat tax". Can it be that far off?

Try the early 90s in California under Governor Pete Wilson. The Governor and the Legislature tried just about every conceivable way of coming up with revenue to fix the budget deficit then. And one of them was the "snack tax." What later killed the snack tax was the crazy system of defining what constituted a snack in the case of things like muffins. It was even more ridiculous than the *standards* of judging voter intent with the hanging chads in Florida during the 2000 Presidential Election fiasco. So I guess it goes to show you are behind the times by a good ten years!

Oh, and back in early 2002, a State Senator here in California tried to slap a tax on soft drinks in order to increase revenue but also to discourage children from drinking so much soda, especially from vending machines located in and/or near schools. They also tried to apply a sin tax on magazines such as Playboy, Penthouse, Hustler, etc. No word on if Maxim, FHM, or any of the others would've received the same treatment (getting "Wal-Mart'ed")...

Re:It's about tax revenue

[dnotj]

Colorado had the "snack" tax or a form of it. Same idea, standard sales tax was charged on food purchases at convenience stores. BTW, food is not subject to sales tax in Colorado.

The reason I left Colorado is that it was getting to be too much like California. And yes, I'm behind the times in Cali, by choice, atleast 15 years I'd have to guess.

Also, by "FAT TAX", I meant an extra cost for every gram of fat in a package of food. Go to Mcdonalds, buy a Whopper, it has 279g of fat, pay an "extra" 27.9c or something.

Re:It's about tax revenue

[The Lynxpro]

"Go to Mcdonalds, buy a Whopper, it has 279g of fat, pay an "extra" 27.9c or something."

A Whopper at McDonald's? Pigs must be flying right now... :)

But seriously, I wouldn't mind a very lite-fat tax if the money was set aside to provide lipo-suction for the truly obese. I'd rather government pay to alleviate their troubles versus labeling them disabled and get to sit home, not work, and collect a check. That and it would alleviate the violations of personal space on public transportation and in airline seats too...

Re:It's about tax revenue

[crayiii]

Seattle tried to pass a coffee tax last month.

The need for regulation

[bizcoach]

As long as only very few people used voice-over-IP, there was clearly no need to regulate. Any problems with voice-over-IP telephone would affect only the small percentage of people who use it, but not the economy as a whole.

When a technology becomes mainstream so that a big portion of the economy depends on it, or the privacy of a large part of the polulation depends on it, then it needs to be regulated.

Re:The need for regulation

[MlBruehlly]

" When a technology becomes mainstream so that a big portion of the economy depends on it, or the privacy of a large part of the polulation depends on it, then it needs to be regulated. "

Oh, you mean like the Internet...?

Re:The need for regulation

[bizcoach]

Oh, you mean like the Internet...?

Yes. There should be laws with some teeth to properly punish those who would intercept or re-route internet traffic which was not meant for them. Verisign comes to mind...

Re:The need for regulation

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. There should be laws with some teeth to properly punish those who would intercept or re-route internet traffic which was not meant for them. Verisign comes to mind...

These laws ALREADY EXIST. Why create more and rely on the government more?

Besides, the problem with VeriSign is that they were given a monopoly to run .com and .net by THE GOVERNMENT. Now you want to get the feds involved yet again to increase regulation?

How about we decrease regulation instead?

Re:The need for regulation

[bizcoach]

How about we decrease regulation instead?

Decreasing regulation is good whenever it can be done without undesireable side-effects such as e.g. increased risk of disasters (such as power failures, plane crashes, etc) or allowing profit-oriented companies to establish monopolies.

I agree that there are too many rules and regulations today; their total number should be reduced even as new technologies come up and may require some degree of regulation.

This is great!

[FreeLinux]

If you are AT&T, MCI, SBC or some other LEC/CLEC. If however, you are just some regualr Joe it means, no phone discounts for you!

Anyone in doubt

[rnd()]

Anyone who is in doubt about what Gray Davis has done to California need look no further. Excessive regulations harm all industries (not just growing/developing ones).

Re:Anyone in doubt

[Anonymous Coward]

Excessive regulations???

Yes, I agrees. espcially on how excessive he was when the power companies decided to fuck everybody over and he just ignored it.
When Californias needed a leader to stand up to the power companies, he just sat on his ass. The people are not angry at Davic do to some regulatory issues.

Re:Anyone in doubt

[rnd()]

It's not about standing up to the power companies. The deregulation scheme was doomed from the start since it only deregulated the wholesale side. If the retail side had been deregulated, price signals would have moderated usage. Markets didn't fail, but politicians did, only Davis didn't fail by not standing up to the Power companies, he failed by not fully deregulating the industry (retail and wholesale).

Vonage fees?

[EvilStein]

Vonage also lowered the monthly fee, too.

I *really* don't want my VoIP service to wind up with more than 6 different taxes like my old Pacific Bell service did.
I pay PUC/etc taxes on my internet connection already. I really don't want to be double-dipped for my VoIP service.

Re:Vonage fees?

[Anonymous Coward]

I *really* don't want my phone service to wind up with more than 6 different taxes. I pay state/federal taxes on my income already. I really don't want to be double-dipped for my phone service.

taxing the internet?

[guacamolefoo]

Could there be a "no taxing the internet" test case in the works as a result of this?

GF.

This is stupid

[smackjer]

Will IM clients like Yahoo Messenger, AIM, etc, which allow you to talk to someone using VoIP be regulated the same way, and be on the same fee schedule? This is another case (like the RIAA) of technology rendering certain cash-cow business models obsolete. These industries and the FCC/government (via tax revenue and fees) are accustomed to raking in cash for providing a service whose infrastructure is not only outdated but insufficient in many cases. I think for the first time in history we are seeing capitalism getting in the way of progress.

Re:This is stupid

[Symbha]

Obsolete? That's hyperbole.

AT&T is in the midst of upgrading their junk to voip in their core.

This is just a way for the encumbents to keep the new guy down long enough for them to get entrenched, again.

Re:This is stupid

[smackjer]

If they need to resort to anticompetitive practices like raising the barriers to entry, I think that's a strong case that their business model is obsolete. I would compare this with saying that everyone who uses public transit to commute to work still has to pay the tolls that would have applied if they drove on the highway.

Re:This is stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

If you think that capitalism is to blame here, you are very confused about what it means.

Which really isn't surprising because large organizations that survive by legislation would like you to believe that they're good capitalists. WRONG. Capitalism is all about letting the market decide the winner. Not about buying enough corrupt government officials to get laws passed that prop up an obsolete business model and keep you in business long after the market would have gone on to better things.

No... what we're seeing here is progress being hindered by government. And I think you'll concede that there's nothing novel about THAT.

Re:This is stupid

[smackjer]

You make a good point, that the responsibility/blame really falls on the gov't in this case because it's ultimately their decision. However, do you think they would have come to the same conclusion (or even considered the issue in the first place) if the monopolies running the show weren't in their pockets and bitching that their profits were in the shitter?

Re:This is stupid

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure. It shouldn't be surprising that the monopolies would try to buy laws. Not right, but not surprising either. Rather than getting their laws, they should be turned in and punished. But, the system is so corrupt that I've probably just made you laugh with that statement.

Really, the blame comes ultimately to the American public for not getting some people with integrity into office and for being so easily manipulated by big business.

And we're being punished for our mistakes. Interesting how that works out.

Re:California

[NightSpots]

There's one party in california raising taxes: Democrats.

There's a reason there's a recall right now: the tax paying citizens are tired of paying taxes.

There's a large part of california that pays no taxes (ie: all of the immigrants making minimum wage, and people who don't work, but rather sit on welfare), and they're perfectly happy seeing taxes go up and up, because they (supposedly) get "more services", and it doesn't (directly) cost them anything. Of course they vote democrat. There's also the leftist crowd (those who vote on single issues such as pro-environment, pro-abortion, pro-gun-control, regardless of the rest of the issues) that push the democrats into the majority, and allow this nonsense to continue.

The rest of us pay for it out the ass, but there's not enough of us to do much.

what do you epxect from california?

[Horny Smurf]

California is a bastion of tax and spend. Consider that there is not one Republican elected to a statewide office, and they are a minority in the legislature. The democrats pander to the hispanics ... who vote based on how illegal immigrants are treated. Resulting in welfare benefits and drivers licenses for illegal immigrants. Add on the myriad of voter-propositions that dictate how much money is spent on education, placing limits on property yaxes, etc, and the only way for gov't to run is increased taxes, often falling on businesses.

I moved to CA in the early 90s to catch the internet-dream in its youth. I moved back to the midland before the bubble broke because the writing was on the wall: California faces a bleak future. Fact: CmdrTaco is gay..

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[stratjakt]

My favorite line from the Davis apologists is the one about how all those illegals "contribute to the economy", working in fields or whatever.

I'd California's current situation proves that all that untaxed income from being payed under the table does nothing but hurt real business and citizens who have to pick up the cost of all these social programs with higher taxes.

It's not like illegal field workers are big spenders.

Oh well. If California was the size (economically and politically) of Rhode Island noone would give a rats ass. The sad thing is, what happens there affects the whole country.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[SirGeek]

California is NOT the only state that limits their taxe rates on property taxes.

Mass has a law that was named Proposition 2 1/2 .

It limits taxes (other than sales tax and income tax) to no more than 2.5 % of the value. Meaning that Rates are typically 25 per 1000 for value ( on houses and vehicles ). How do they get around this limit ? They increase the evaluation of the home so that instead of earning 2500 on a 100,000 house, they re-evaluate the house to 125, 000 and increase their revenue to 3125 without anything new. They get an instant 25 % increase in tax base.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[Anonymous Coward]

Here Here, Tucson is doing this right now

They cap property taxes and the keep saying that my house has increased in value 10% a year for the past five years.

That being said my house is still taxed less than what I paid for it but in two more years that will not be the case.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[crow]

You totally misunderstand how Massachusetts' Prop 2 1/2 works.

Towns are allowed to raise property taxes by 2.5% per year without an override vote. However, if property values change, the per-$1000 tax rate also changes to keep the amount of tax paid the same (on average). Hence, if house prices in town double, my taxes stay the same unless my house's value tripples.

So this becomes a huge problem for home owners when a $100,000 house suddenly becomes a $250,000 lot based on the tear-down value of the land for new construction. Outside of that case, the tax rates are reasonably fair. (Though I'm not convinced that property taxes are a good idea in general, but that's another debate.)

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[Henry V .009]

Ways that America loves illegals more than citizens.

I do not have anything, however, to buttress your last statement.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[pmz]

The sad thing is, what happens there affects the whole country.

California is still the fifth largest economy in the world. The democrats screwing it up affects everyone.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[rbird76]

One problem : who buys the services provided by people employing illegal aliens? Why, lots of people...meaning that a lot of people do in fact benefit because they get services without paying for the taxes that they would normally have to pay (as a part of their service costs). If the lack of taxes doesn't decrease the effective price of service, it increases profits, generating money which is taxed (at the corporation or personal level) and ends up getting spent anyway. Oh, and the people getting paid under the table get paid less (because they can't complain - who would they go to?) while at the same time paying lots of taxes (mainly consumption taxes such as sales tax which are also high in CA) while not drawing on governemt services (with the possible exception of health care, which of course is going up everywhere faster than inflation anyway).

I don't like the influx of illegal aliens anywhere, but money is not likely a reason to argue against their presence.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[Anonymous Coward]

If the illegals weren't working in the fields your parents would be paying much more for their food, and your dumb ass would probably be out in the field picking vegetables to help pay for it.

I say that, because if you were an adult, you'd probably appreciate that relationship a bit more, so obviously your not. Or you've got more money then sense.

The fact is, these people are willing to work longer for less then us white people. I'm not saying that it's right, or even ideal. However, that's the way it is for now.

Go to Europe, and see how much food costs.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[Anonymous Coward]

Umm no, food is cheap because the government is kicking out fat subsidies to the landowners to keep it cheap.

Instead of using those subsidies to both keep prices low and folks employed, it instead goes into their pockets, and the jobs go to illegals who are willing to work for below minimum wage.

Re:what do you epxect from california?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hello, fuckwit.

The government pays people NOT to farm, to keep market prices relatively high, so that the whole economy dosen't freak out and mass suicide.

Yes, of course. There is a strange dynamic in food production. However, most farms are NOT subsidized. They may be given tax breaks for their agricultural status, special insurance rights, etc. etc. The only subsidized farms are those that can't make it without help, usually because they grow something out of the ordinary.

Boy o boy

[stratjakt]

California's governors sure do know how to drive business out-of-state, don't they?

My VoIP phone is ringing. It's Ahnold. He says "Hasta la vista, baby bells!"

Re:California

[Anonymous Coward]

We don't. That's why we're recalling our asshole governor next week.

Re:She doesn't need a licence...

[Anonymous Coward]

Shiny. Red. Vinyl.

Why isn't there good peer-to-peer voice over IP?

[Animats]

Vonage sells a handset that plugs into an Ethernet jack. It's a client that talks only to their servers. Why hasn't someone else done this, but minus the servers? This is, after all, truly a peer to peer application. All you need is some way to find people, a problem that the "file sharing" community seems to have solved adequately.

This was on NPR this morning

[pmz]

and all I could think was "Here is a promising industry coming to fruition, and, now, the government and the legacy phone companies want to fuck it over. Holy flaming shit on a stick."

Re:This was on NPR this morning

[Symbha]

The legacy companies will be in the same business.

EVERYONE will upgrade their networks to VOIP. It makes sense. The same paradigm as stoplights (switched network) versus stop signs (circuit network.) You can simply move more stuff around in a switched/ip network.

Regulation is just their way to buy longevity to their monopoly. Pay off some politicians, and kill the up and comers while you buy yourself time.

Re:This was on NPR this morning

[Politburo]

Yeah I heard this on Morning Edition as well, but I thought the piece there talked about Minnesota? I cannot recall.

Not Just California though

[w.p.richardson]

California (for better or worse) tends to lead the country in many matters. With this regulation, they open the door for other states to do the same thing, then the feds will get involved.

It's curious to me how people will applaud regulation when it comes to consolidation of media assets, yet they howl when there is a fee tacked on to their VoIP bill. These are both functions of regulations - it's OK when it stops you, but God forbid it ever touch me! Fairly hypocritical.

Re:Not Just California though

[Oliver Wendell Jones]

it's OK when it stops you, but God forbid it ever touch me! Fairly hypocritical.

Well, duh... Are you new to Slashdot?

Simple Rules:
1) If its good for ME then it's good for EVERYBODY
2) If its bad for ME then its bad for EVERYBODY
3) If its bad for (MICROSOFT|RIAA|MPAA|SCO) then its good for EVERYBODY
4) If its bad for LINUX then its bad for EVERYBODY
5) If it involves Natalie Portman, Beowulf Clusters or Pants Full of Hot Grits then its good for EVERYBODY
6)If it involves the GOATSE guy its bad for EVERYBODY.

Did I miss any?

Re:Not Just California though

[spac]

7)If it's in soviet russia, it's a bad cliche for EVERBODY.

Re:Not Just California though

[Oliver Wendell Jones]

Thanks! I knew I would forget one...

Seems fair for commercial VOIP providers ...

[hattig]

... to follow the same regulations as non-VOIP providers r.e. telephony.

It shouldn't affect ad hoc setups as far as I can see (it is only data) though. It might affect larger scale free services though, like AIM/MSN voice chat.

Re:Seems fair for commercial VOIP providers ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, well, okay. And if I break your legs then it would only be fair for me to break your neighbor's legs too.

Not that it would be right. But then we'd do better to be fair than right... right?

Maybe not.

VoIP tax is going to happen.

[jbottero]

John Leutza, director of the California Public Utilities Commission's telecommunications division. "They sure look like a phone company in nearly every regard," he said in an interview Tuesday. "This will be California's policy, going forward."

Regulators are typically of the same general mind set as monopolists, and in an earlier day they would probably all have worked for railroads. But while VoIP offers some of the same services as telephone, there are significant differences in the technology, as pointed out in many posts here. I don't think the current laws will support the CPUC position, but just like chumming for fish, where there is money to be had, the politicos will be swarming.

VoIP has a big potential to cut into the bottom line of some DEEP POCKET telephone companies, and you can bet these people's money will grease the pockets of the politicos in California.

ring ring, VoIP companies, California is calling..

[The Lynxpro]

...And the Golden State definitely needs some more revenues, excuse me, "licenses" to help fix our ongoing fiscal problems. Perhaps those companies should send some campaign contributions to some of the candidates going into October 7th... They better not call though...

Re:California

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a reason there's a recall right now: the tax paying citizens are tired of paying taxes.
--snip--
There's also the leftist crowd (those who vote on single issues such as

Um, and voting on the single issue of taxes is not?

Typical

[thefirelane]

With Gray Davis' days numbered, the California legislature is cranking out as many liberal laws as possible. The Wall Street Journal has an article about it on the front page.

This legislation serves two real purposes: winning over many Democratic supporters and interest groups and giving Democrats ammo to fire against Arnold when he repeals them. Note, the last reason is fairly typical of any political group.... Clinton signed environmental legislation that was extremely harsh, knowing that if Bush won he'd have to repeal them which would let Democrats call him anti-environmental (If Gore won, no one would care about him repealing the laws, as it didn't fit into the stereotype)

Recent CA laws passed include:

• granting illegal immigrants the right to driver's licenses
• enacting the nation's toughest financial-privacy and antispam measures
• expanding the rights of gay domestic partners

and coming up: requiring businesses with 50 or more employees to provide health insurance or pay into a state pool to purchase the coverage


---Lane

Re:Typical

[pmz]

granting illegal immigrants the right to driver's licenses

They don't need US driver's licenses, because a mutual agreement with Mexico would be sufficient.

enacting the nation's toughest financial-privacy and antispam measures

Making doing business in California harder than ever.

expanding the rights of gay domestic partners

The fact that the government has the gall to legislate lifestyles is appalling.

Politicians suck (okay, most politicians suck).

Re:Typical

[notcreative]

• granting illegal immigrants the right to driver's licenses
• enacting the nation's toughest financial-privacy and antispam measures
• expanding the rights of gay domestic partners

Those laws are awful! They might result in the horror of

• People without documents (who assuredly aren't in the US right now) learning basic road safety and having an incentive to pass the driver's test.
• Fincancial privacy and less spam.
• Legal, secular recognition of devoted partnerships that form the basis of families.

If only a cyborg from the future would come back and fight the future!

Re:Typical

[Anonymous Coward]

a mutual agreement with Mexico would be sufficient

California doesn't have the power to enter into treaties with foreign nations.

Making doing business in California harder than ever.

If your business revolves around gratuitous credit checks and spamming then you should be driven out. Good riddance.

The fact that the government has the gall to legislate lifestyles is appalling.

Expanding legal rights to gay couples does not constitute "legislating lifestyles," whatever that means.

Re:Typical

[pmz]

Expanding legal rights to gay couples does not constitute "legislating lifestyles," whatever that means.

Yes it does, because it implies they didn't have those rights before. Marriage should not be a legal entity, period, except when any two or more people agree to share property and money (for estate planning purposes).

Re:Typical

[Fulcrum of Evil]

Making doing business in California harder than ever

Exactly what business are you in that you need to sell my financial details and fill my inbox with shit?

The fact that the government has the gall to legislate lifestyles is appalling.

Hey, they give recognition to straight couples, why not gay couples?

Re:Typical

[pmz]

Hey, they give recognition to straight couples, why not gay couples?

Exactly, what I'm saying is that the government shouldn't even be making these distinctions.

Re:Typical

[Simple-Simmian]

Actually Arnold is for the last 2. #1 is plain stupid and is nothing be an invatation to fraud. Most sane people in California have no problem giving domestic partners the same rights as "married" people. They do have problem with gay "marriage" That will not get repealed. #2 is a no brainer, it will not be repealed. Double taxing VoIP will kill it. VoIP is Dead in California. Actually California is dead too it just hasn't noticed it yet.

Re:Typical

[LMariachi]

Fair enough, except that marriage involves a lot more than a joint bank account. Health insurance, hospital visits, pensions, government benefits -- none of those things are subject to a simple "incorporation" contract drawn up between a couple. All California is doing is preventing (for instance) insurance companies from denying benefits to a gay partner where they would provide them for a straight partner.

Re:Typical

[pmz]

none of those things are subject to a simple "incorporation" contract drawn up between a couple.

Why not? A contract is a contract. This is why I don't understand all the government's distinctions between gay, straight, polygamy, etc. If I have three gay lovers, seven straight ones, and two pigs for good measure, as long as they all agree to be beneficiaries (by default for the pigs, of course) why should the insurance companies care?

Re:Typical

[LMariachi]

Don't think life insurance, think health insurance. Most health insurance plans cover the insured's immediate family. The more members that can be disqualified from immediate family status, the less the insurer has to pay out. Similarly, widows and widowers continue to collect on their spouse's pensions until their own death. If they allowed for a Heinleinian line marriage they'd be paying that pension forever.

Of course there are ways around these sorts of details, but none of them escape the necessity of legal recognition or limitation.

Re:Typical

[Malcontent]

Insighful?

Should be +1 republican. There is no reason to show insight when you can simply parrot Rush LImbaugh and get modded up.

morons demand end to phonIE payper liesense scams

[Anonymous Coward]

talk is cheap? no, i mean free? as in speech? as in whois doing the talking? as in all the phonIE ?pr? ?firm? hypenosys you can .consume?

on corepirate nazis/stock markup felons/the walking dead, va lairIE's whoreabull PostBlock(tm) devise, etc...

whatever works...

that's right, after the walking dead finish exterminating themselves, & sadly enough, some of us, it won't take long to clean this cesspool of greed/fear execrable up.

we're calling it the planet/population rescue program (formerly unknown as the oil for babies initiatve).

the Godless wons are helping by continuing to show where their hearts lie.

what's wrong with folks selling their kode? if it causes convenience, & interoperates with all the other kode on the planet, we say, no harm, no foul, so long as you fail to employ gangsterious/felonious practices to asphyxiate the 'competition'. sabotaging your free version of anything is a tad dastardly. if there's value added, without FUDging up the compatability, we'll pay. same with music. no more gouging dough though.

fortunately, mr stallman et AL, etcetera, is now offering comparable/superior software, to the payper liesense spy/bug wear feechurned models, in almost every circumstance. there'll be few, if any more softwar billyonerrors, as if there's a need for even won. tell 'em robbIE. you are won of the last wons whois soul DOWt, right? .asp for va lairIE's whoreabull pateNTdead PostBlock(tm) devise?, used against the truth/to protect robbIE's payper liesense stock markup bosses/corepirate nazi 'sponsors'. yuk.

back on task.

what might happen to US if unprecedented evile/the felonious georgewellian southern baptist freemason fuddite rain of error, fails to be intervened on?

you already know that too. stop pretending. it doesn't help/makes things worse.

they could burn up the the main processor. that would be the rapidly heating planet/population, in case you're still pretending not to notice.

of course, having to badtoll va lairIE's whoreabully infactdead, pateNTdead PostBlock(tm) devise, robbIE's ego, the walking dead, etc..., doesn't slow us down a bit.

that's right. those foulcurrs best get ready to see the light. the WANing daze of the phonIE greed/fear/ego based, thieving/murdering payper liesense hostage taking stock markup FraUD georgewellian fuddite execrable are #ed. talk about a wormIE cesspool of deception? eradicating yOUR domestic corepirate nazi terrorist/gangsters will be the new national pastime.

communications will improve, using whatever power sources are available.

you gnu/software folks are to be commended. we'd be nearly doomed by now (instead, we're opening yet another isp service) without y'all. the check's in the mail again.

meanwhile... for those yet to see the light.

don't come crying to us when there's only won channel/os left.

nothing has changed since the last phonIE ?pr? ?firm? generated 'news' brIEf. lots of good folks/innocents are being killed/mutilated daily by the walking dead. if anything the situations are continuing to deteriorate. you already know that.

the posterboys for grand larcenIE/deception would include any & all of the walking dead who peddle phonIE stock markup payper to millions of hardworking conservative folks, & then, after stealing/spending/disappearing the real dough, pretend that nothing ever happened. sound familiar robbIE? these fauxking corepirate nazi larcens, want us to pretend along with them, whilst they continue to squander yOUR "investmeNTs", on their soul DOWt craving for excess/ego gratification. yuk

no matter their ceaseless efforts to block the truth from you, the tasks (planet/population rescue) will be completed.

the lights are coming up now.

you can pretend all you want. our advise is to be as far away from the walking dead contingent as possible, when the big flash occurs. you wouldn't want to get any of that evi

Spannish-American war telephone tax?

[emil]

Some telecommunications taxes have been around for a long, long time. Do you think that we should just plop them down on top of TCP/IP? I don't.

Re:California

[NightSpots]

It's not the single issue of taxes, it's not even the single issue of money in general.

It's taxes, high spending, and illegal raising of "fees".

It's giving licenses to illegal immigrants.

It's pandering to special interests (which increases spending, which increases taxes)...

It's reverting to 'bilingual education' rather than english immersion in order to separate mexicans from the rest of the state.

There are LOTS of problems in california right now. The money issue is just the one that gets people to vote.

Free Market

[Anonymous Coward]

This is a great thing! After all these VoIP companies follow suit and jump the California ship like other business is doing, maybe the voters in California will stop choosing Socialist idealogues for leaders.

Protect Free Markets!

Re:Free Market

[0x0d0a]

Oh, great. Corrupt rich old white men beat that pants off of a socialized system.

New vs. Old

[PingXao]

It's the same old story for the pols. They've always regulated and taxed telephone companies, i.e. those who transport sound from one phone to another. This is no different to them. They can't distinguish between completely different types of technology. The Internet is "new", so they have thus far avoided taxing the 'net because they've "never done that before". Nationwide, they even prohibited state sales tax from being collected on purchases over the internet. The politicians really are clueless. Enjoy it while it lasts because once they get a bite of the apple it will be all over and net taxes will be everywhere. Trying to reason with regulators over whether or not VoIP should be taxed and regulated the same way as traditional phone companies is like pissing into the wind.

Re:New vs. Old

[Knackered]

Nationwide, they even prohibited state sales tax from being collected on purchases over the internet.

No they didn't. They prevented states from imposing blanket access taxes on internet service. There are still moves afoot to create a simplified framework for the collection of sales taxes for inter-state purchases, regardless of how the purchase originated. The reason this isn't done at the moment is that it's too awkward to collect, not that it's illegal.

Re:New vs. Old

[Aidtopia]

Nationwide, they even prohibited state sales tax from being collected on purchases over the internet.

False. The moratorium on Internet taxes did not undo sales and use taxes already imposed by the states. In fact, a law was passed to close a loophole that had allowed a major online bookseller (bn.com, I think, but it may have been borders.com) to skip collection of sales tax in California.

Just because an out-of-state retailer doesn't collect sales or use tax on an online (or catalog) sale doesn't mean that you don't owe that tax.

Can I interest you in the Brooklyn Bridge?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a very special deal for you and you alone. I am presently offering for sale to you, the Brooklyn Bridge at the unheard of low cost of $1,000,000.

As you already know this bridge is heavily used and could generate massive revenue if you wished to charge a toll for crossing it. But, you would also be protected from fraud, illegal wire taps and your privacy would be assured.

I'm sure that you won't be able to pass up this great offer and I wait patientlt for the delivery of your cheque.

Re:Why isn't there good peer-to-peer voice over IP

[kwerle]

There are various IM clients that do this.

I use ichat AV.

Because Apple is a CA company, and they host part of the ichat solution, it will be interesting to me to see how/if this affects them.

Re:California

[Anonymous Coward]

You know that San Francisco is in California right?

Maybe they can answer your last question for you :-)

A good example .......

[big-giant-head]

Of why business is leaving california faster than ever. If they keep this up CA will become just a bunch of Hollywood Stars and some farms and vineyards in the valley........

Re:A good example .......

[Simple-Simmian]

The farms are all going to go out of production. The cost of irrigation is going to price them out of existance as well as having to provide health care for all employees. (Davis will sign the bill in spite not because it's a good thing to do.) Food grown in Mexico will be cheaper. All the water rights will be sold to LA. End of story. California is dead. Welcome to Mexico.

Vonage is NOT P2P

[justMichael]

With Vonage you can call ANY phone number you want, not just some other VoIP phone.

And you don't get a "handset" you get a Cisco ATA186 that you plug any phone you want into.

It talks to their servers becasue at some point it has to get injected back into the POTS network as an analog call.

Re:Vonage is NOT P2P

[Anonymous Coward]

"becasue(sic) at some point it has to get injected back into the POTS network as an analog call. "

Which is precisely why they're getting regulated like a Telecommunications Service, because they ARE a Telecommunications Service.

Re:Vonage is NOT P2P

[Animats]

Hmm. OK, suppose you built a box like a combination of the Cisco ATA196 and and a DSL router. You plug it into the DSL line, and you plug your phones and computers into it. When you make a call, it first tries the call via a VoIP peer to peer network, and then over the regular dialed network. Sell it as a "free calls within your calling circle, which is everybody who has one" box.

Re:Vonage is NOT P2P

[justMichael]

That actually sounds like a cool concept. It doesn't fit into what I use Vonage for, but I like the idea.

When we signed up for Vonage, 2 years ago, we did it becasue my wife was in sales and had clients all over the place. 2 calls to the UK cost more on a land line than we pay for a month of Vonage ;-)

Re:Vonage is NOT P2P

[Animats]

There's a real peer-to-peer potential here. Use these units to deliver calls into the ordinary phone system as local calls. If you have one, and you're on the peer to peer net, and someone needs to call a number you can call for free, and you're not using your phone, your line is used to deliver the call. This is just like in-house corporate VoIP, but on a smaller scale.

The Phone Company has been doing this for faxes for years. Their service isn't that popular, but it tends to keep the prices down on email-fax conversion services.

wow

[nege]

Interesting that one of the cornerstones of a civilized society is the ability to quickly and effectivley communitcate in a meaningful way. Yet our society seeks to stifle this with licences, fees, and administrvia that continue to errode our communication capabilities...for the sake of what...profit?

Re:Wow

[LMariachi]

As an added bonus, legal California residents will have their licensees considered invalid as a form of ID most anywhere else, and will have to lug around their passports.

Or the DMV could cleverly print an indicator on the licenses of undocumented immigrants. You know, the way they already do for underage drivers. When was the last time you needed an extra piece of ID to get into a bar just because teenagers can get licenses?

Re:Wow

[notcreative]

Well, speaking as an amazingly naive person who isn't a CA resident, what I've read made it sound like the reason for the CA deficit was a vast reduction in capital gains and income tax revenue brought on by the collapse of the stock bubble and many Silicon Valley companies. Obviously, the concept of a "deficit" comes from spending money, so you can always chase your tail, but the fact that it hit all at once was at root a sharp reduction in income rather than a sharp increase in spending.

Some businesses are running out of CA. Some businesses are moving in. CA would be the 5th biggest economy in the world if it were a nation. No one can afford to ignore it as a market. It has problems, but it isn't the worst place in the world to do business.

I don't think that advocating basic health care is "providing everything for ... workers." Regardless of whether you think that the government should provide health care or not, the fact is that the government already provides health care through Medicare, Medicaid, state programs, and laws that require hospitals to treat emergency room patients whether they have insurance or not. CA is trying a solution to a national problem that will not go away, even though this White House Administration would like to. There are 43 million Americans without health insurance of any kind. What is wrong with trying a new solution to the problem?

As for the other things, they of course all sound nice... but in practice only serve to discourage business and drive away jobs. There's a limit to the amount of whoring out to business that a state can do without penalizing its own citizens. To take your argument to its conclusion, we should have slave labour camps, no minimum wage, and allow unlimited pollution on private property. Most people agree that there should be limits to the amount of exploitation that businesses have. As I mentioned above, right now small businesses are ignoring the health needs of their workers, which is variously burdening the workers themselves, the government sponsered safety nets, and the taxpayers that pay for those programs. I think it is reasonable to expect the free ride to end at some point. This isn't the particular implementation I'd favour, but it might work.

An elected government has a responsibility to represent the citizens that elected it, of course, and some of the citizens apparently feel that there are good reasons to take care of non-citizens. Speaking of amazingly naive, why do you think those "illegal" immigrants are in this country? Are they simply wintering here as a vacation? They are here because they do jobs that no one else wants to do. You can argue about whether that is a good thing or not, but that is undeniably what is happening. Some citizens, although apparently not you, feel that if people are going to be in this country, they should have to follow the same laws as the rest of us. That means that they should have a license if they are driving. A license also allows some method of allowing them to have bank accounts, which decreases the cash economy, in turn decreasing theft and criminal predation upon this population.

I like the way you call my post naive and in the same sentence claim to know the "reason" behind a bill in the state legislature. Legislation rarely has a single reason. Often it is a compromise. If a majority is required to pass it, and that majority is composed of people with differing agenda, then the odds are that they have different reasons for voting that way.

The most important point is that there has to be some limit on business, and that the limits CA imposes are reasonable if unpalatable to some conservatives. My favorite Bush argument is that the economy would be "a lot worse" if he hadn't been shilling for big companies and the upper class for the last three years. How would it be worse? Would we be standing in line at soup kitchens? Would we be building new dams? Eating each other and cooking our pets to stay warm? With his argument, he can do anything at all and claim that it could have been worse. No shizit, it could have. My question is: why isn't our economy better yet?

Re:Wow

[swb]

Or the DMV could cleverly print an indicator on the licenses of undocumented immigrants.

Something similar is done in Minnesota now -- licenses for legal aliens expire when their current visa does, and I think they flag the licenses as belonging to a non-resident.

As reasonable as this sounds to me, the liberals in Minnesota dumped core when this was introduced and sought to have it blocked. It was originally an administrative mandate, which was overturned, and then was given legislative approval.

It's become apparent to me that there's some weird liberal/illegal immigrant political alliance that I don't quite understand -- they can't (legally) vote, they often don't pay income taxes (no SSN, work cash jobs, etc). I can only surmise that most immigrants are non-white, and doing anything seen as anti-non-white is tantamount to racism, ergo liberals must support illegal immigrants.

Which flies in the face of support for all kinds of other traditional liberal issues, like finding work for unemployed low-wage citizens, keeping the welfare system afloat, and attracting enough middle-class voters to remain viable.

Re:Wow

[swb]

As an added bonus, legal California residents will have their licensees considered invalid as a form of ID most anywhere else, and will have to lug around their passports. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't an elected government supposed to represent the citizens that elected it?

The big mistake was made with widespread use of the driver's license as anything more than a license to operate a motor vehicle on public roadways. If that was all it was good for, I would only have half the problem I have with the illegal immigrants being given driver's licenses.

As much as I hate to advocate this, it is time we had a US citizen ID card that was ONLY available to US citizens and was the only legally sanctioned form of identification.

Even if handing out California driver's licenses to mexicans helped the driving situation (in Cal? I doubt it), it's the defacto ID card everywhere and can be used to build an identity the undermines the legitimate citizenship process.

Re:Wow

[thefirelane]

heh... First off... in my previous post my browser must have messed up... As written, my first reply (the one that is about what I think is naive) doesn't make much sense.

It should read:

The real reason for this law is to try to get as many illegal immigrants to be able to vote (presumably Democrat) as possible

With out that, the sentence is at best confusing.

The Naive part, is that I don't think anyone who is honest with themselves either Democrat or Republican (I'm neither by the way) would really say that the point of the drivers license for illegal immigrants was to make them aspire to obtain a better driving record.

In fact, I would imagine no one would drive better than someone who is an illegal immigrant without a driver's license... considering any traffic infringement leads to automatic arrest and deportation.

Again, Do you honestly think that legislation was aimed at safer driving standards, or what it perhaps just a bit of rhetoric on your part? If it was an honest belief, I just think it was a naive one.

As for the rest of your post

what I've read made it sound like the reason for the CA deficit was a vast reduction in capital gains and income tax revenue brought on by the collapse of the stock bubble and many Silicon Valley companies.

Yes, but that was my point: The government increased spending during this bubble. It was spending money that was based on a revenue they should have known would not continue. This was irresponsible and should not have been continued. This is the fundamental difference I was trying to point out about liberals.... That when they see a surplus, they think "great, now we have enough funding for project X or Y" and authorize it. When revenue falls, a deficit grows but no one wants to cut spending, they raise taxes (which often times leads to a short term surplus, which gets spent). If you listened to the California Debate, this is exactly what the Green party candidate said he'd do: "I'd raise taxes on the rich, and with the surplus generated I'd create low income housing..." and some other things.

Obviously there are two parts to a deficit: income, and expense... when the income is less than the expense, you have a deficit. I merely said.. there is a deficit because the expense was built up upon an unreasonable expectation of income. Your reply to me was "no, it is really because the income fell".

Some businesses are running out of CA. Some businesses are moving in.

This really isn't open for debate. Businesses are leaving California, and heading to more friendly states. This is why neighboring states have such low tax rates: to attract growth.

For the first time, California is seeing a net loss in US. citizen population movement. Namely, more people are leaving CA than moving to there. The population is still growing however, through an influx of illegal immigrants.

What you will hear from people (Bustamante said it in the debate). Is that "during the dot com bubble, we saw X number of businesses founded per day, today we are seeing Y businesses stated per day. (where Y>X). This is misleading however, as often times during recession we see many individuals who can not find work starting their own companies (it is why home unemployment numbers often much lower than industry unemployment numbers... like we see now)

There are 43 million Americans without health insurance of any kind. What is wrong with trying a new solution to the problem?

The problem is, government being in charge of health care is not a new solution... It is done in Europe and leads to disastrous consequences:

Experience overseas shows that governments that pay for prescription drugs tend to involve themselves extensively in both pricing and availability. So, while the EU drug-approval process is relatively speedy, individual nation

Re:California

[Pxtl]

Umm, actually, its not the taxes, its the debt thats causing the recall. After all, every dittohead I've heard that's screaming for Davis' heart is because he lied about the deficit. Not the taxes.

how will this impact Longhorn?

[The Lynxpro]

One of Microsoft's big aims with Longhorn was to offer VoIP support to every office cubicle via the operating system. Will Microsoft's DRM come into play to enable this?

Re:how will this impact Longhorn?

[mabhatter654]

But that's an internal case again. You can only use in instead of a traditional wired phone system. The difference is like said above, these are Cable or DSL companies that are providing REAL phone numbers, and alternate non-telco based lines...not just VOIP service.

This is really no different than calling cell phone companies "phone companies", why not when the only difference is that they don't have wires...same thing here. This isn't an attack on general VOIP chat...yet?

(Dirty) Business As Usual

[mariox19]

I wonder how much of this has to do with lobbying from the telcom industry. No doubt politicians are salivating at the prospect of more taxes, but aren't the traditional telephone companies worried over the "unfair" competition?

Sadly, there are two ways of doing business in the American economy: out do the competition, or bury them through political pull. VoIP threatens the status quo in the industry, and I'm guessing somebody from the telcoms is whispering in the ear of the politicians and greasing their palms to shackle VoIP with the same regulations they work under -- even though the rationale for those regulations applies even less to VoIP.

Okay, I'm offering no hard evidence, other than history and how this has played out time and time again in other industries. I say that's enough that we should all be on the lookout dirty pool.

(Make all the foil hats and X-Files jokes you want!)

Re:Makes sense to me..... (Good Point, but)

[Dave21212]

Interesting point, but nowadays fraud is ignored (eBay, PayPal), there is (almost) no such thing as an illegal wiretap, and privacy is an anachronism.

Triple Bullshit on you

[muckdog]

You are already paying tax and regulatory fees for your cable and DSL lines. Why should you have to pay them again for VoIP?

Re:Triple Bullshit on you

[zipwow]

Even more, why should you have to pay them again to people who don't own the lines?

If VoIP is the way to go, leave it unregulated, and let the phone companies do it instead of their regular phone service. They can become providers of general connectivity instead of sound in a can.

What's standing in the way of that? Isn't that a better solution anyway?

-Zipwow

Re:Triple Bullshit on you

[dubiousmike]

I suppose one theory would be that your fees on cable and DSL lines would go down as revenues are recognized from VoIP fees (by and for the government).

Its just as likely that they will create new infrastructure (buerocracy) to govern VoIP which will give them *some* reason for the new fees. Of course, its easy to justify charging you more than they need to. Then they can do some humanitarian-esqe thing like bring VoIP to farmers and fishermen and guys living under bridges to further provide support for their perpetual existance.

Instead of griping about it, think of a way you can make it pay off for you. Start your own non-profit that makes use of VoIP.

Re:Triple Bullshit on you

[dachshund]

I'm already paying tax and regulatory fee for my local phone number, but I still have to pay tax and regulatory fees on my long distance usage. That's how I would look at VoIP providers in this instance; as long-distance providers.

Therefore, they can be taxed, but at the much lower rate that LD providers are taxed at, not at the rate that local providers are taxed at (because you're already paying these charges.)

My bad

[mariox19]

And I promise to proofread more carefully next time!

Is this double taxation?

[frkiii]

The "recovery" fee is a tax.

Isn't the internet already run on telecom lines, with the exception of direct satellite and cable?

I use DSL at home, and pay taxes on lines.

Isn't this like taxing twice for the same thing?

Regards,

Fredrick

Why don't they tell the regs to get bent?

[Dynastar454]

So what if Vonage or some such comany moved to Canada? Besides possilbe higher connection fees for the data -> POTS connection is there any way US regulators could do anything to them? Someone enlighten me.

Cut spending where?

[burgburgburg]

Since neither Arrnold nor McClintock are willing to enumerate where they'd cut spending, perhaps you'd like to.

Re:Cut spending where?

[Anonymous Coward]

Hint: It won't be in corporate welfare, payouts to energy companies or enforcement of the DMCA.

Re:Cut spending where?

[NightSpots]

Actually, McClintock has said explicitly that he'd roll back all programs to their 1998 levels, which would cut spending by around, oh, a measly 30 billion.

Arnold has said that he wants an outside audit of all spending, and that anything deemed wasteful would be cut. Right now, for instance, the taxpayers are paying for 44,000 new jobs (created in the last three years), many of which (~15,000) aren't filled because there's no office space. The salaries for these jobs still get paid to the departments (once it's allocated, it's paid), and are basically vanishing... This type of waste (fraud is more accurate) needs to be eliminated.

Re:Cut spending where?

[Anonymous Coward]

You've not read this, yet, have you?

CAFR

The politicians in Sacramento are shaking in their shoes at the prospect of an independent audit. They have been lying to you. Judgement day draws near.

Re:California

[Jhon]

...because he lied about the deficit. Not the taxes.

Actually, it's because he not ONLY lied about the deficit, he lied that taxes would not need to be raised. Days after he was elected, he said: "Oh... that 4 billion shortfall I was talking about? It's really 30+ billion". Then he trippled car registration (tax). Then he talked about going to the California supreme court to remove the 2/3ds assembly/senate majorities needed to raise/levy taxes. Then he talked about raising the highest income tax bracket to over 11% (which in CA starts at $38k!). Then he talked about raising sales tax...

Believe me... as a Californian, it's about the taxes and it's about spending money we don't have. If ANYTHING has come out of the recall effort so far, its that the surest way to PISS OFF the voters is to raise taxes to cover spending money we didn't have -- and it stopped most of what Davis and the legislature wanted to do.

we need to slashdot some assembly members

[hansreiser]

Let's get some email addresses of state assembly members, PUC members, the gubernatorial candidates, etc., list them on slashdot, and I bet just a few tens of thousands of emails will get us some action.....

"I'm from the Govt., and I'm here to help you!"

[Newer Guy]

Yeah, RIGHT! With help like yours, who needs hurt? Hmmm...what's that other truism..the one about coming and a mouth?

Calling Vanatu...

[poptones]

I wonder what the tax rate is in vanatu? I wonder how these state legislators will deal with US "phone" companies pulling up skirts and hightailing off to wired countries that don't try to tax every new service that competes with their old services?

Between this and the p2p networks lobbying to tax everyone to pay "compulsory" fees to record industry dinosaurs, it looks for all the world like the US is determined to toss away any last tiny vestiges of "technical leadership."

As I've said before...

[IPFreely]

It's not about carrying voice traffic over TCP/IP, though that is what the name implies. What these VOIP companies are doing is tying their internet operations into local REAL telephone connections. They are using normal, dialable 7/10 digit numbers to identify destinations, and they are crossing traffic over between internet and telephone networks.

AOL Talk, MS Netmeeting, heck even Battlecom allow you to carry voice over IP. But the difference is you can't dial up you phone number from Battlecom and make your phone ring.

The VOIP in these cases are companies that tie into real telephone networks. They issue real telephone numbers to their customers. You can use a normal telephone to reach them. That means they are regulatable by the same standards as normal telephone. The regulators own the address space, not just the service standards.

The easiest way to avoid this regulation and fees is not to tie into the telephone network, don't use the same 7/10 digit address space and don't claim you can call normal telephones. You do that and there's no fees and no regulation.

Re:As I've said before...

[mjh]

The VOIP in these cases are companies that tie into real telephone networks.

As I've said in another post, the lines that connect VoIP to the PSTN are already regulated and taxed. That tax is paid for by the company who leases access to those lines. This situation is EXACTLY the same as a company who owns a PBX that connects out to the rest of the PSTN. The company is not required to tax every line that they plug into their PBX, only on the line that connects them to the PSTN.

How is this situation different than VoIP? So far as I'm aware, Vonage (et al) already pay taxes on the lines that connect their network to the PSTN. So why should vonage customers pay taxes that are already being paid?

Re:As I've said before...

[IPFreely]

There is a difference. If you have a PBX with ten trunk lines, then you have ten telephone numbers going into them. Its like having unique IP addresses on unique ten interfaces.

But VIOP is more like a router with a subnet. They have a whole set of telephone numbers behind there. They don't have one line for each number they manage. So in theory, they could be taxed by number rather than by line. That makes a big difference.

The difference really is that they represent a pool of numbers rather than a simple set of lines. It is a similar interface to how cellular networks tie into land based networks. They interface with a switch that allows all of those numbers to be switched by address rather than by line. Its a lot different interface than a PBX.

Re:As I've said before...

[RustyTaco]

Ever heard of DID (Direct Inward Dial)? Trunks and phone numbers are in no way connected. It's trivially easy to have unique telephone & FAX number for everybody in a 500 person company(1000 numbers), and still only have two T1s (48 trunks) feeding them. It's really neat stuff. Most VoIP gateways take in T1s directly, and support DID so that they can support all sorts of interesting configurations after they are handed calls from the CO. Vontage might have something spiffier, with higher capacity lines and maybe SS7 signaling instead of T1+DID, but the net effect is the same: They tell the local monopoly exchange to send all call for the numbers Vontage operates to their trunk group.

- RustyTaco

Re:As I've said before...

[mjh]

The difference really is that they represent a pool of numbers rather than a simple set of lines.

Rather than repeat what's already been said, I'll simply ask you again to explain how the situation with VoIP is different than a company with a PBX?

Re:This is good

[bigjnsa500]

Why, then would anybody want to earn a decent living? Would you want to be rich when you know 70-80% of your income is going towards these socialist programs? Why be rich at all?

Re:California

[bigjnsa500]

I have a solution, just give California back to Mexico!

California government

[bs_02_06_02]

Did something happen that required California legislators to step in and create this legislation?
Did I miss something? What prompted this?

It's clear that we'll hear "great things about this much-needed legislation" over the coming days.
I suspect that California legislators simply want to restrict freedom. They don't want free choice (without paying.) It gives legislators a feeling of power. "Look what we did! We did this for Californians! You should be grateful!" They'll claim, "We gave the people of California great things with this valuable legislation." These same legislators will stand and say, "We saved the poor and homeless from thieving, scandalous VoIP companies!"

Usually, there's also a tax revenue component. Legislators gather around in groups, thinking of ways to gather more tax money to spend. How else do you get a $40 billion deficit? It doesn't take a brain child to figure out that CA has a spending problem. Nope... they need more money. "Raise taxes. Think, people... think! There are people without jobs out there. We need to raise taxes. Quick!"

They spent money for years, and now they don't have enough to cover the bills... taxes for VoIP is someone's idea of a solution.

Wait until some legislators write a bill to tax email. It'll happen. I guarantee it.

It's no surprise that so many (legal) citizens are moving out of California. Soon, CA will be just a collection of illegal aliens, and the government.

Frankly, I think VoIP companies should just cease to operate in California. Stay out. Teach the government a lesson. Instead, they'll just pass this on to the consumers, and everyone ELSE will pick up the bill. Then, legislators will complain about the high price of VoIP, and they'll create add price-controls to control VoIP prices. More government!

Re:California government

[Simple-Simmian]

It's spelled total one party doninance. One party in power and control of all organs of government. Waste a corruption is rampant. Yes I am in California and a native son. Political monocultures are bad. They stifle and kill technology and business. VoIP is dead in California. Thank the Democratic dominated government for it.

Re:California

[Anonymous Coward]

As soon as France is returned to the Celts.

What about Roger Wilco?

[Anonymous Coward]

I wonder if they're gonna force all the voice chat software makers out there to register as telephone operators. Seems to me the only real difference is that companies like Vonage have dedicated hardware instead of software.
This is total BS and must be stopped.

Re:What about Roger Wilco?

[westlake]

Roger Wilco isn't promising instant "dial-up" connectivity to every wired and wireless telephone on the planet.

More complete story on California regulating VoIP

[gardel]

This story was reported by Voxilla.com a day before CNET got to it. Voxilla's report is much more thorough. You can read it at http://www.voxilla.com/Article25-nested-order0-thr eshold0.phtml.

double tax

[blitziod]

so i have to pay state tax on on my cable/dsl connection THEN pay again to use some of that same bandwidth as a phone line? That is making me pay twice for the same BW and connection.

Pricks!

[Anonymous Coward]

They feel they're being left out of fees, regulatory charges and taxes that they get on regular landline phones? God forbid the FCC and state regulators don't apply the same/more rules and taxes on a newer form of communication (ie cheaper). Someone just might get through a 10 minute LD phone call w/o giving the gov't money in the form of taxes! Cynical as it is, I know the gov't needs money and whatnot for valid regulatory issues...but come on. Stifling small budding business as it is...pricks.

Why does govt. like to tax voice comm so much?

[mdpowell]

Seriously.

There's other monopoly-style utilities, such as electric, water, and maybe even cable that don't have as many stupid taxes tacked on.

We have the flat 3% federal phone tax, imposed during the Spanish-American War as a *luxury* tax. I hardly think phones are a luxury any more.

We have the Al Gore Tax (Universal Service Charge), ostensibly to provide internet service to schools and phones the "poor" or those in rural areas. That's 9-15% for most people Yet something like 85%+ of public schools have internet access. I have no idea how poor you have to be to get some of this money, but it must be poorer than undergrads or grad students with no income, because I know of no students getting relief. As for rural areas, they were all wired 50+ years ago, and none of my relatives living on farms more than 20 miles from the nearest town get any relief either.

Then we have the 911 tax, which sort of makes sense. But you would think that would come out of city funds paid by sales/property/income taxes. After all, what about the sales tax I already pay on my phone bill?

Then we have the "number portability" fee, which I've been paying for years on both cell and landline, yet when I ask Sprint/Verizon if my number is portable, they say no.

And now we have the "carrier cost recovery charge," which telcos are tacking on to cover other "regulatory" burdens.

And more.

It's ridiculous. Why is a basic service like voice comm targeted for so many taxes?

Re:Why does govt. like to tax voice comm so much?

[DavittJPotter]

Because if you can't talk to your neighbor, your mom, your old high school buddy who lives in the next state, you can't plan anything unsavory. You can't share opinions. You can't find out what the news said in MN compared to TX. You'll only have the opinion that the telescreen^H^H^H^H^H^Hvision shows you. And we all should trust that.

Laws at Layer Seven...

[pegr__]

Is an VoIP company a phone company?

I think the bigger issue is regulation at the application layer... So what if this goes through... Are Usenet taxes far behind? Or how about the RIAA getting a cut of all P2P traffic based on stats collected by the ISP? Where does this end? And if it MUST happen, wouldn't it be the job of the Feds and not the states?

Re:California

[Monkelectric]

The real problem is -- voting for a Republican is a crime against humanity and voting for a Democrat just proves you're stupid.

Californian's don't want ANY of these asshats to be governer. But at the same time we're terrified not to vote because of the 2000 presidential election.

Look at the choices -- davis, the guy who made the state a national joke, arnold -- the guy who wants to make the state an international joke, or bustamante -- the guy who wants to make us a state of mexico.

Quick Buy Office Space in Nevada/Arizona/Oregon!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Reno here they come!

Hey, VOIP guys, come to Arizona! We'd love to have you here. Hopefully our politicians don't hav thier heads up thier butts as much as your's do.
You can get an autographed copy of my resume by replying to this message with an address- preferably a shiny new arizona one!

Absolutely right.

[Anonymous Coward]

This needs to be modded WAY up.

If you're going to be interfacing with the POTS, using regular phone numbers, and providing the exact same service as a regulated industry, you're going to be regulated as well.

Long live isolationism and racism!

[poptones]

There's a large part of california that pays no taxes (ie: all of the immigrants making minimum wage, and people who don't work, but rather sit on welfare), and they're perfectly happy seeing taxes go up and up, because they (supposedly) get "more services", and it doesn't (directly) cost them anything.

All those "immigrants making minimum wage" DO fucking well pay taxes. Unless they are doing someone's yardwork for cash (which anyone can do, BTW) they are paying FICA, and social security (to someone else's account or even an account that doesn't exist), and federal tax and state tax - all of which most NEVER GET BACK because they are illegally working in the US and cannot collect that "refund" come April.

I lived in LA. I had a nice apartment in the hills with a view of LA and it cost me way less than $1000 a month - mostly because it was a six unit flat-top and the landlady paid a mexican immigrant about a fifth what "real" plumbers, electricians, and gardeners would have charged her to maintain the place. I've seen that system from both sides; want to see things really get expensive? Close off the border so the apartment landlords all have to pay five times as much for garening and lawn services, and the restaraunts have to pay three times as much for busboys and dishwashers and all those other laborers you never see. All people who, BTW, would now be free to make use of that infrastructure they support with their taxes.

You wanna see the tax base really erode? Run the illegal Mexicans out of California.

Re:Long live isolationism and racism!

[Jhon]

Close off the border so the apartment landlords all have to pay five times as much for garening and lawn services, and the restaraunts have to pay three times as much for busboys and dishwashers...

Your argument is silly. You state that these people already pay FICA and SSI -- yet you imply that gardening and lawn service employees make 1/5 minimum wage right now and that busboys and dishwashers make 1/3 minimum wage. If this is true, I can assure you that they do NOT pay FICA and SSI as they would need to be paid under the table because that would be in violation of labor laws regarding minimum wage.

Right now, those services you listed pay minimum wage. Are you sugging that if we lock down the borders that the guy who mows my lawn is going to start getting paid $30/hour (about 5x minimum) and busboys are going to make $18/hour? If so, maybe I should go to lawn-mowing-school.

Re:Long live isolationism and racism!

[poptones]

I dunno where you live, but gadners in LA typically get MUCH more than minimum wage. Even the illegal immigrant performing gardening services (and plumbing, and electrical) for cash was getting more than minimum wage.

Where do you live? I didn't work there myself, but I'm certain even the McD's in LA was paying more than minumum wage. Some were even offering signing bonuses...

Re:Long live isolationism and racism!

[Jhon]

I dunno where you live, but gadners in LA typically get MUCH more than minimum wage.

I'm convinced. You're smoking crack.

I live in LA -- the SF Valley. Why don't you open up a copy of the LA Times -- check for jobs. I bet you can find an opening for a grounds keeper SUPERVISOR for $12/hour -- I know this because I looked it up. Thats a SUPERVISOR. The typical lawn-mower guy or leaf blower makes around $6/hour (minimum wage).

Are you further suggesting, in your crack-fog stupor a guy who mows lawns NOW makes even $10/hour? And if we close down the borders will suddenly make $50/hour? I recall you saying the costs would be 5x... 10x5=50.

Regarding McDs... I've seen job postings stating a starting wage of $7/hour in my neighborhood... granted, it's above minimum wage -- but not by much. Before the abundance of unskilled labor, those jobs were typically done by high-school students. My guess is that the market would move back to them if your fears of instant economic desaster were even remotely based in reality.

Taxed to death!

[Newer Guy]

Everyone is right. This is another attempt to tax me more. Many here have said that since Vonage is a telephone service, it should be taxed like one. I disagree. First off, I must have DSL to use Vonage. There's no other way. Adelphia cable has capped upstream at under 100K in Santa Monica, and Vonage won't work at all when someone is surfing the web with cable. This makes DSL mandatory. Next, I MUST have a Verizon telephone to get DSL. Verizon charges me many, many taxes just to have a telephone. The taxes are almost half of the 34 dollar bill in fact. I have Spring long distance, which is supposed to be free, but I find that I have to pay something like 6 plus dollars a month in Taxes just to have long distance I don't use. Last month, my total Sprint LD bill was 8 dollars. Like I said, over six of it was taxes. I may drop it next month. DSL charges me about four dollars a month in taxes. That's another 8 percent in taxes. Now Vonage is charging me six dollars a month in taxes for my four numbers. Let's do the math: Taxes collected: (conservative estimates) Verizon: 12.00 Sprint: 6.00 DSL: 3.85 Vonage: 6.00 Total: $27.85. I pay another over 30 bucks a month in taxes for two mobile phones. These are the taxes that I pay just for the RIGHT to RECEIVE PHONE CALLS! I haven't made a single call yet! To me at least, sixty dollars a month is telephone taxes is too much already! Now they want MORE? I don't think so.....

Re:Taxed to death!

[Anonymous Coward]

Definitely get rid of Sprint.
You can sign up with WDT (http://www.mywdt.com) and access it by dialing an 800 number like a calling card. This avoids most of the taxes.

This is an outrage!

[Wonderkid]

What is going on here is that the corrupt telcos who could not innovate if they tried are using their influence to bribe politicians to do what they can to bring down VOIP. It is time for rev olution folks, and I mean, in the streets, not just online.

Re:This is an outrage!

[EllF]

" It is time for rev olution folks, and I mean, in the streets, not just online."

Go start one. We'll be right behind you. Really.

Re:California

[Anonymous Coward]

There's a large part of california that pays no taxes

At first I thought you were talking about the big corporations and wealthy elite.

(ie: all of the immigrants making minimum wage, and people who don't work, but rather sit on welfare)

Now I know who to blame for all of this mess in California... It is the poor immigrants and the homeless! Wow you are brilliant!!!

wow California, waaay too cool...

[tandr]

I guess soon they going to lick special stamps for every e-mail they send...

Re:One more reasont to vote for Schwarzenegger

[Anonymous Coward]

The special inetersts are trying to control the VOIP market and regulate it to death. There simply are no good reasons to regulate VOIP.

One thing I know and that is Arnold Schwarzenegger would not put up with this kind of BS.

If the California legislature passes regulation, the people should repeal the legislation via the initiative process.

Wow

[thefirelane]

People without documents (who assuredly aren't in the US right now) learning basic road safety and having an incentive to pass the driver's test.

Wow, that is amazingly naive... The real reason for this law is to try to get as many illegal immigrants as possible. If you can't see this (no matter what side you're on) you are pretty blind

As an added bonus, legal California residents will have their licensees considered invalid as a form of ID most anywhere else, and will have to lug around their passports. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't an elected government supposed to represent the citizens that elected it?

As for the other things, they of course all sound nice... but in practice only serve to discourage business and drive away jobs. This is similar to the workers comp. issue and health insurance.

It would be great if we could legislate "all businesses have to provide everything for their workers"... but then the businesses leave, and the unemployed are worse off than they would have been if they had a job with slightly worse health coverage.

On top of that, the remaining businesses (and people) have to be taxed more to make up for the reduction in revenue of those who left... causing them to want to leave (wash, rinse, repeat). It is how you wind up with a state in deficit, with both businesses and people running out.


---Lane

Shouldn't Phone lines be UNTAXED .

[zymano]

Phones = True Free speech. Why the hell does no one sue these governments that want to tax it. It's unjust.

On the rollback suggestion:

[burgburgburg]

Isn't a large portion of the California state budget entitlements with set levels? Does the governor have the ability to roll back all programs to 1998 levels?

Does this rollback include police, fire fighters, EMT, hospitals, education? Since there was no Homeland Security program in 1998, where would he set that level?

Considering the population increases (with concurrent needs increases) since 1998, won't 1998 levels of spending be drastically insufficient to meet the levels of service expected by the people of California?

Re:On the rollback suggestion:

[Anonymous Coward]

Population + Inflation = 24% increase (needs)
Revenues = 27% increase (means)
Spending = 44% increase (oops)

See the problem? I do.

Re:California

[ninewands]

Quoth the poster:

There are LOTS of problems in california right now. The money issue is just the one that gets people to vote.

Whatever it takes to get them to vote is a GOOD thing.

Bad eyes or something.

[medscaper]

At the very least, I hope he creates ripples over here.

I have got to get a better monitor at work.

I could have sworn that said, "I hope he creates nipples over here."

I thought, "Well, that's one way to get elected..."

It's all about the Definition

[Qbans]

There needs to be some definition of what exactly a phone company is. If I shoot VoIP across the room will I need a license for that? What about companies that use it internally, are they going to need licensing? Traditionally none of these situations required any specific licensing.

I could understand that some regulation should be in effect, especially when companies like Vonage start to introduce critical services like E911. On the other hand, I don't think the regulations should be so strict that the place an undue strain on VoIP providers. When people's lives are in hand though and every minute counts perhaps it would be a good idea for public/consumer VoIP providers to undergo some licensing. At the same time VoIP termination services shouldn't need to be licensed for that matter, since they pay significant regulatory fees and the worst that could happen is a few failed phone calls (which anyone using the service should expect with any emerging technologies.)

Traditional phone companies have extremely strict standards to maintain their uptime, not limited to NEBS and BITS (anyone that's seen what the NEBS testing procedure is will know how strict these standards are.) Public VoIP providers shouldn't be allowed to bypass these uptime requirements. Should I be a public VoIP provider if I have a AS5300 with some voice cards in it, a PRI and Asterisk running on some 486 sitting in a closet? Probably not, I wouldn't really trust that setup to a possible critical phone call that may be made from time to time.

I think what the governments should look at VoIP through the eyes of consumer. They are looking for an affordable service that may replace their POTS landlines, and hence may be required to perform under emergency circumstances (specifically E911.)

You're almost right

[Dark Nexus]

The only problem with that is that it's a DIFFERENT medium. This means that you can't just apply the same laws and regulations - that would cause too many legal and logistical problems. What's needed is a parallel set of laws to fit the new medium.

As for those that are saying that it should be left unregulated, you just keep saying that until telemarketers start using VoIP, bogging down your internet connection 24 hours a day, and you have no legal challenge to the government recording every single word you say, or even the paranoid guy next door recording it all.

They're way ahead of ya...

[khenson]

Bill 602P was proposed to allow the US Postal Service to collect "Alternative Postage" on every email transmitted in the United States. Read about it (Good Writeup Here).

My opinion, FWIW, is to stop voting for these Rousseauian bleeding hearts who believe any form of discretionary income in the hands of the populace needs to be surrendered to the state for proper even distribution. It's a sad, sorry state of affairs but I believe America is waking up. We'll see...

Re:They're way ahead of ya...

[Anonymous Coward]

I remember that email bill.
Truly, I think the problem here is arrogance among the legislators. They genuinely feel that we are stupid, and that they are the only people qualified and wise enough to "fix" things. They don't put enough faith in the free economy.
Don't you think that VoIP companies will succeed or fail based on word-of-mouth? Special Interest Groups need to lobby for the same freedom from taxes, not for VoIP to be taxed.

Sadly, these legislators want nothing more than to leave a legacy. "Look what I did." There's no humility. Why do you think the press is so buddy-buddy with politicians? It's good fodder to sell newspapers.
The arrogance displayed by most politicians is like football players celebrating after they make a routine play. These legislators did their job, big deal.
The first example off of the top of my head, I listen to the garbage that comes out of Sen. Diane Feinsteins' mouth, and it makes me want to throw up.

Sorry, there are millions of people that do their job, and never get any thanks. Deal with it. You don't have to have your butt kissed by the public just because you created some new law, or "taxed the rich."

First the Governor, now this...

[Lodragandraoidh]

First they call a referendum against a duly elected governor. Now they want to regulate the internet.

This is just the last two in a long string of incidents that reinforces my belief that California should fall into the Pacific Ocean, and be done with it.

Of course, if that happened then all of the sane people would end up on an island, and Snake Plisken would have to come in and save the day...after which he would fry the internet anyway. So, pick your poison.

Tariff-raff

[Doc Ruby]

Telecom "tariffs" cover more than just rates. They also cover quality of service. Without the telco regulations, the guaranteed dialtone might not have knit this country together in the 20th century, and we might be a lot more like South America now. I remember (in 1994) actually winning battles (over the phone, natch ;) with NYNEX (read: Verizon) engineering managers in the 1990s, when modem installations wouldn't work in midtown Manhattan. They'd claim we needed a "data line" ($$$$$$) and a "data interface" ($$$$$$) in order to use modems >9600bps (!). The problem was that they were not syncing the master/slave timing signals on the line from the modem to their Central Office, which resulted in phase errors in the signal. While humans require (at least ;) two ears to detect the phase errors, a modem "hears" noise, seeming to receive lots of '{'es. When I invoked the tariff clause requiring the phase quality, pointing out that it would be delivered when they set the master/slave configs properly, the manager stopped fingerpointing and stonewalling, and fixed the problem at the CO (thereby fixing the entire Photo District). Who knows how long NYNEX (Verizon) would have taken to supply even 14.4Kpbs connections to the Web, which were so popular just 6 months later.

We need *some* regulations to keep slippery telcos from shortchanging the consumers in the heat of "competition". When there really *is* competition in telco-land, we could experiment with allowing consumer-mobility to "regulate" the providers with their "invisible hand". When they work, decentralized markets demand higher quality from competing providers than laws do. But unregulated monopolies are worse. The right way out of the mess is to distinguish between essential services, monopolies, and competitive quality, and regulate the market for maximum freedom of (and from) marketing.

Re:Quick Buy Office Space in Nevada/Arizona/Oregon

[Simple-Simmian]

The problem is Californians will bring their wacky ideas and political demands with them. The tax increases will follow. I am a native Californian and I don't think you want most of us. We apperently expect stuff free. We just complain when we have to pay for it after demanding that we have it. Californinas don't want to pay the bills they just want the services. VoIP is dead in California for sure now as soon as the cost of service doubles due to taxes and tarrifs.

Re:Why isn't there good peer-to-peer voice over IP

[Skapare]

The problem is, people with VoIP services want to be able to call any phone number. That means VoIP service providers are really gateways to the telco network. And that's where the tax comes in.

What we need is basic IP access with sufficient bandwith to all end users, static IP for everyone (need to move to IPv6), and then we can do VoIP on an end-to-end basis by "dialing" someone's hostname (with end user aliasing to make it easier to call friends). Then we won't need those gateways.

Greedy governments will still try to tax it. But if everything is hidden in end-to-end authenticated encryption ... oh wait, they'll start taxing encryption.

Deja vu anyone?

[rokka]

1. 1) Fasttrack releases VoIP software (http://www.skype.com), which people like and use because it's a nice idea.

1. 2) Big brother tries to regulate VoIP.

1. 3 )Big brother sues Fasttrack but fails because Fasttrack registered their company god-knows-where.

1. 4) Big brother goes after and sues the shit out of the Skype users, including a 10 year old girl, who realized she was doing something wrong but couldn't care less, and a 56 year old woman, who enjoys rap, but hasn't touched a computer ever.

1. 5) Profit?

I don't get it--can some explain VOIP to me?

[swordgeek]

Maybe I'm being thick here. It seems to me that what we need for VOIP is a peer-to-peer protocol, and network cards/stacks that have a guarantee of service, where in this case, the service is time-based. Now if I'm not mistaken, the Linux 2.4 kernel has 'quality of service' flags for network traffic (including IPv4), and IPv6 has it built into the actual model! Now if this is the case, there should be no need for VOIP "providers," other than ISPs that don't explicitly deny a particular traffic type. Now this is all theoretical for real-time conversations, but in practice it's much easier--people use things like teamspeak all the time!

Can someone please tell me why we are looking to a centralised (and billable, taxable) VOIP strategy, instead of a direct peered (or even client/server) model? I honestly don't get it!

Re:California

[Anonymous Coward]

42,000 people (much less than one percent) pay about 37% of all the taxes in California.

End of story.

taxes = corporate welfare

[Doc Ruby]

Cutting spending in California should start with the bang for the buck: millions in corporate welfare. Like the money that ratepaying state agencies paid to monopoly market-gamers like Enron, before Gray Davis blew their books open and sank their battleship. Do you think that Arnie (whose characters usually run on batteries) will do that, when his total recall cannot recollect his meeting with Ken Lay, captain of the titanic failure?

States also protect their citizens, which we pay for, at a bulk-rate discount, in taxes. Which services would the Gubernator cut?

Re:This is good

[Excen]

Ah, the classic Ayn Rand argument against Socialism. I cannot wait until a majority of people of a particular voting district realize how bloated the system of government in the U.S. really is. The libertarians need to obtain a few million more voters for logic to return to american government, assuming that it ever could.

On a side note, the parent argument would be more effective if you had left out decent.br.

California is demented.

[Agent R]

This is the same state that is allowing illegal immigrants get driver's license. So they would rather kill businesses that would actually bring money to the state than depart the leeches that come here illegally and pay 0 in taxes. (And don't tell me that they pay ther fair share in taxes since that the majority of these bozos get paid under-the-table. Meaning they pay zip.)

Capitalism to blame?

[Anonymous Coward]

These industries and the FCC/government (via tax revenue and fees) are accustomed to raking in cash for providing a service whose infrastructure is not only outdated but insufficient in many cases. I think for the first time in history we are seeing capitalism getting in the way of progress.

The capitalism in this whole picture is the emerging VoIP market. The problem apparantly now hindering it is taxation by the government. Therefore it is the government trying to protect any "cash cows" that may exist, not true capitalists.

Re:This is good

[bigjnsa500]

Classic, meaning I am not the only one who thinks this is a bad thing. The government is bloated, I'll give you that. But why are they bloated? Because we as voters put the wrong people in office, then gave them free reigns for our tax dollars.

Have you ever heard a politician say "I think this is a bad polcy" or "I think we should do this." Its always I, I, I. It should be "The people put me in office and they want me to do this".

Re:California

[bigjnsa500]

Like that will ever happen.

hmmm can we say..

[ShadowRage]

special interest?

someone comes up with a new technology, some asshat corporation uses the government to rid of a possible new threat to their existance, which goes against free enterprise.

the licensing deal is ok, at least they arent trying to shut the technology down and make it useless, I plan on looking into VOIP, if I can call some of my international friends for less than a local call, so be it.
that's if VOIP can access normal phones...
can it?

Cable Companies, etc

[mabhatter654]

There are a large number of Cable companies getting in on the VOIP thing, and perhaps wireless or others. Cable Companies don't pay all those state & federal fees like telcos do. They are end-running the system and using their "protected" status to get into telephony. In a way this is actually good. Once Cable companies count as phone companies, the double-standard will break down and there will be more competition for cable services opened up!

VoiP is READY for you... OT/informative

[dougnaka]

VoiP IS ready for YOU!

I completely replaced my home phone with packet8's VoiP product. I have wireless internet where I get 384k/384k for $50/month with a steep $700+ setup fee. I pay $19.95/month for unlimited calls to any phone in the US/Alaska/Hawaii/Canada. That's the POTS (Plain Old crappy Telephone Service) network. If anyone I knew had a packet8 phone we could call back and forth unlimited for free.

Now, Packet8 uses considerably less bandwidth than a Vonage (like 8k/sec), but sounds pretty good usually. Sometimes I'm amazed at the clarity, and sometimes there's echos. Sometimes there's bad distortion like a choppy cell phone call, but not normally. Sometimes the thing stops receiving incoming calls and needs a reboot.

I dont use my home phone that much, but going all cellular seemed like we were missing the essentials, so this is a happy middle.

We dont have a few features, like the Caller ID only works for the number, no names. Vonage apparently has names both ways (in/out). It's not a big feature for me, so I'm ok with it. The voicemail light stays on if I get a message until I reboot the device (which takes about 5 seconds). Sometimes I try to dial out and get a busy signal, rebooting the device usually fixes it.

What did I do to switch? Sign up for service, at packet8.net or vonage.com. Wait for your device to come. Test it with 1 phone, once you're happy it works good enough to ditch the phone company, call & cancel the phone service. Make sure your home line is dead, disconnect the incoming line from your phone system, and plug in your packet8/vonage box in like a normal phone. Now ALL YOUR HOME PHONES WORK using VoiP!

How much money did I save? Well I was paying $120/month average. Barely using long distance, but I did have DSL which was $40 for just the line and I paid another isp $20/month. So I went from $80/month with limited long distance to $19.95/month with no surprises and no stupid Spanish-American war leftover taxes.

Screw you Qwest! Screw you Sprint! Screw you MCI! You ripped me off one time to many, and your customer service SUCKED! :P

Here is a comparison of some VoiP features. He's wrong on some things, and ignore the VoicePulse entry, they're only available in like 3 states, unless you live in one of those states.

Also, read the VoiP forums at dslreports.com for good info on VoiP.

They haven't been lying to me.

[burgburgburg]

I live in NYC. I'm just asking where the budget cuts would be coming. Both Arrnold and McClintock say they'll be cutting, but don't say where.

Re:They haven't been lying to me.

[Anonymous Coward]

You still don't understand. Read California's Comprehensive Annual Financial Report. If you don't believe the link posted above, just go to the state's own website and read it there.

There is NO need for any cuts whatsoever. They actually have billions in surplus that the sheeple never know about. Like I said, they are lying to their own citizens.

While you're at it, read the CAFR for New York. CAFR NY

If that doesn't make you mad as hell, you must already be dead.

Which still doesn't answer:

[burgburgburg]

Where specifically are the cuts to be made?

Not Liberal at all, but rather, protectionist.

[weston]

the California legislature is cranking out as many liberal laws as possible.

"Liberal" law? The kind passed by the sorts of liberals our friendly neighborhood right-wing pundits imagine they're combatting?

Seems far more likely to me this law is actually passed by at best a market competition conservative (and at worst a capital-crony cheap labor conservative) who wants to make sure no young, technically superior, feature-richer telecom company is going to have a leg up on the traditional telecom behemoths.

I don't have any particular beef with the fees because even though I'd rather see services like vonnage tear out of the gateway, yes, I can see the logic that it's all telecom and needs to meet certain service standarads that are funded by fees, and I have faith that Vonnage is going to win out anyway, fee-level playing field or no. But the idea that this is a liberal taxation plot is just ridiculous.

I'll bet some folks think that recent raise on vehicle taxes is a Gray Davis liberal taxation plot as well, when, in reality, that is a consequence of laws passed in 1998 specifying what would happen on budget deficit.

I did read it. It's beside the point.

[burgburgburg]

Since neither one of the major Republican candidates has expressed any interest in stopping up the supposed budget deficit with this money and both have said that they will deal with the deficit with budget cuts, I'm asking: Cuts from what? Cuts from where?

Reading comprehension

[poptones]

Yours is utterly fucked. I repeatedly use the words "garden services" and you then translate this to "lawnmower man." Crack? I think you're looking in the mirror, bud. There's a fuck of a lot more to maintaining a grounds than pushing a goddamn lawnmower.

And let's not overlook your convenient and repeated ignoring those other functions - like electrician and plumber. Have you ever had to hire a plumber? And your assertion is one can be had for a mere ten bucks an hour?

Crack, indeed.

And what about your insipid bullshit about those "illegal immigrants" not paying taxes? Rfemember them? The ones that actually do pay state and federal taxes and are refused those services they help support with their own hard work? You seem quite anxious to forget them, so I just thought I'd remind you...

Re:Reading comprehension

[Jhon]

Yours is utterly fucked. I repeatedly use the words "garden services" and you then translate this to "lawnmower man." Crack? I think you're looking in the mirror, bud. There's a fuck of a lot more to maintaining a grounds than pushing a goddamn lawnmower.

I like how you avoided your karma bonus in that drivle . I'll expand on "lawn-mower-guy" to include "garden services" and suggest once again you open up an LA Times classifieds and verify how out of touch you are.

And let's not overlook your convenient and repeated ignoring those other functions - like electrician and plumber. Have you ever had to hire a plumber? And your assertion is one can be had for a mere ten bucks an hour?

I've never hired a plumber or electrician who wasn't obviously legal resident. Plumbers and electricians are (a) high-skilled and (b) expensive. Not something usually filled by unskilled labor who can't enter the country legally. Are you suggesting there's an abundance of "undocumented workers" working for A-dee or Roto-Rooter?

Crack, indeed.

Well... maybe crystal meth.

And what about your insipid bullshit about those "illegal immigrants" not paying taxes? Rfemember them? The ones that actually do pay state and federal taxes and are refused those services they help support with their own hard work? You seem quite anxious to forget them, so I just thought I'd remind you...

Refused services? Have you ever been to King/Drew? Oliveview? LACUSC? You must be smoking crack. Believe me, the sales tax these people pay do NOT cover those expenses.

Face it. California has made a practice of exporting wealth and importing poverty. Sooner or later, the 'foundation' will fail and the 'house' will collapse. There is a reason why the US has immigration laws -- which I should reminding you are FAR more liberal that most other countries. Wouldn't it be nice if they were inforced? I would suggest that even in the STRONG liberal outpost that is california, this is by far the most popular belief. Just look at the overwhelming passage of Prop 187 and the back-lash of the recent AB60.

Bye bye, Bustamonte!

[Ungrounded Lightning]

If the companies in question inform their customers in a timely manner this might further sink Bustamonte's chances in the recall / replacement election.

Regardless, I bet Cisco (and several other CA-based providers of VoIP gear) will have something to say about it.

sales tax?

[poptones]

there you go again. Many of these people (I would even venture "most" of them, although that depends on wh9ich study you believe) have actual jobs that put them on payrolls. That means payroll taxes and NOT just "sales tax." I've made this clear several times now, but note again how you refuse to address this in your fallacious meanderings.

So far as "inforcing" (outdated) immigration laws - well, how exactly do you propose doing that? Spend more on policing the businesses that hire these workers? Spend more on hardware to patrol an essentially unpolicable desert? Spend more on building even higher walls? Spend more on prisons to retain them when they're caught and buses to ship them back? And what about the coyotes that ship them here? It's the insane laws that ship these people back across the border the minute they are caught that allows the smugglers to operate essentally without risk. The harder you make it to get across the border, the more they will charge and the more people will die - and, in the process, the smugglers profits increase.

Talk about tax and spend... you're talking about spending money - which will have to come from the tax base - while eroding that tax base.

The US has spent a goddamned fortune on this nonsense and it serves no one. Policemen and immigrants die in the desert, all for want of a buck. If these people are so determined to come to work that they will risk their lives crossing the desert on foot, who the hell do we serve by not allowing them entry? A bunch of nationalistic recedivists? Thanks, but I'd sooner toss my tax dollars into the street than to fund your racist propoganda.

Re:sales tax?

[Jhon]

Many of these people ... have actual jobs that put them on payrolls.

"Many"... A nice vague number. There are an estimated 2.3 million "undocumented workers" in California alone -- and thats from conservative estimates. Far too many of those work off the books and under the table. Further, with the average cost of educating a child in California being over $7000, any tax dollars they bring in are spent on educating their kids alone. You keep saying I'm not addressing PAYROLL taxes -- if you re-read this thread, you'll see that I do -- and DISAGREE with you. You keep insisting that they do -- at least in numbers that make a difference -- but provide no back up material. All studies I've read ALL say that the exact numbers are difficult -- if not impossible to to estimate as huge numbers work under the table.

"Undocumented workers" cost the US overall $67-$87 billion per year. Thats the NET loss -- even after calculating any benefit to the economy. How many LA County hospitals had to close their doors because they couldn't afford all the gonverment mandated services for people with out even medicare/medicaid? Expect to see Oliveview close within the next year. I bet Harbor closes soon after. Pretty soon, you'll be left with just 2 -- LACUSC and MLK/Drew. God help any of us who need an emergency room more than 10 miles a way from either of these.

So far as "inforcing" (outdated) (read: ineffective -j) immigration laws - well, how exactly do you propose doing that?

I heard a wonderful idea in this regard:

Triple whatever the penality is currently for an employeer and include manditory jail time. Offer any illegal employee immunity, perminent residency and fast-track to US citizinship for reporting the employeer -- hell, include the offer to ALL employees of a given business. That would dry up ANY market for illegal labor.

Thanks, but I'd sooner toss my tax dollars into the street than to fund your racist propoganda.

Bite me, you stereotyping prick. You label me a racist because I dont want to pay for the education, medical care, housing (et al) for people who have no respect for our laws and borders? My wife was an immigrent -- as was her entire family. As was my mother. All of whom came to this country legally, respecting it's laws and borders. Far too many studies show the net drain on our economy (California's in particular) and a reasonable solution to STOP the drain when we can't afford it is labeled by you as RACISM? Nice ad homimem.

best democracy money can buy?

[Anonymous Coward]

usually this statement is given by trollish lefties who fail to heed history's lessons in that big government will always be the tool of autocrats and elite.

Things like this have been going on for decades allowing loud lobbyiests to squelch out competition and innovation. Free Market means you have to roll with the punches, but when you get together with your buddies and make government punish anything that would force you to adapt, it is no longer a free market.

Telecomm companies can damn well adapt or go the way of the Dodo.