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Free World Dialup Under The Gun Again

Posted by timothy on from the dealing-with-bureaucrats dept.

PetiePooo writes "The FCC will be holding an Open Commission Meeting [PDF] Thursday. Number one on the agenda is a 'Petition for Declaratory Ruling that Pulver.com's Free World Dialup is neither Telecommunications nor a Telecommunications Service.' By passing this, the FCC will, in Jeff's words, 'send a strong signal to consumers and capital markets that the FCC is not interested in subjecting end-to-end IP Communications services to traditional voice telecom regulation under the Communications Act.' For those unfamiliar with it, FWD is sort of like DNS for VoIP. You give it a FWD phone number, it gives you the IP address of the associated SIP phone. Slashdot touched on FWD three years ago, and again last year."

7 of 153 comments (clear)

  1. New Regulations? by TechnologyX · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Would this mean that the FCC will instead write up new regulations and restrictions for VoIP? Instead of lumping it under Telecommunications?

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    Slashdot sucks
    1. Re:New Regulations? by LostCluster · · Score: 4, Interesting

      No. The threat is that the FCC will lump VoIP into Telecommunications, which therefore subjects them to regulation. Right now, the FCC barely has its hands on the VoIP industry, as the line is kept very close to the traditional telephone systems.

      If you're doing VoIP within the PTSN, or as a last mile connect to the PTSN, you're somewhat regulated as a phone company, all other uses of VoIP are in the clear. Clearly, the phone companies would like that line moved out further, but the tech industry does not.

  2. Powell was on screensavers the other day.. by BrookHarty · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Michael Powell was on the tv show Screensavers over at techtv. He stated he didnt want to regulate, and wanted to open services. He made some interesting comments, like how when the FCC didnt regulate what goes on the Internet, all the services, companies and inventions that came out of it. He then started on the free unregulated spectrum they are allowing people to use for Wifi ISPs.

    He sounds like hes on the ball for most stuff, was rather impressed he wants the market to grow, and to now cripple it with regulations.

    I still don't trust the FCC, but at least it shows he understands the regulation powers of the FCC, and avoiding it. Or maybe he's just not bought by special interests yet.

    1. Re:Powell was on screensavers the other day.. by LostCluster · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Powell's attitude towards the Janet Jackson situation is also being misunderstood in some circles.

      He doesn't want the FCC to have to crack down on broadcast and cable content, he'd rather the media companies control themselves. However, the recent events showed that they aren't self-regulating very well, so he is threatening a serious crackdown because unless they get their act toghether, the FCC has to do so.

      Powell wants the FCC to be hands-off whenever possible, but he also knows when that just isn't possible and he has to take an action.

      I'm very hopeful he rules for "hands-off" in this FWD situation.

  3. FWD rocks by andersen · · Score: 5, Interesting
    I have a Sipura SPA-2000 (which is very very cool) connected to 2 phone lines in my 4 line phone (one line is empty, the forth line connects to my local land line and lets us conference in other people who don't use VOIP yet). I use it to call my business partners for free over the net. That saves us a ton of money over using traditional land lines and paying long distance. Call quality is excellent, and the FWD service works perfectly. We each pay our local ISP for broadband net access (which we were doing anyway before we switched to using VOIP).

    FWD works great and I highly recommend it. They even provide voice mail. Pulver has done a great thing, and the FCC has absolutely no business screwing it up! I don't need to call 911 over IP, and I don't want regulatory access fees and taxes to pay for 911...

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    -Erik -- --This message was written using 73% post-consumer electrons--
  4. It's the phone call that's most contentious by isdnip · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I've posted this before, when the topic came up on another occasion, but it's worth repeating.

    The FCC is NOT going to regulate computer-to-computer "phone" calls. If you run voice over your Internet connection, as an application, it's your business, and that's that. Even the guy who drafted the infamous ACTA petition in 1996 now thinks VoIP is cool stuff.

    The problem is the phone call between the consumer with a plain old phone line and the VoIP network. "Phone to phone" and "phone to computer" calls have a telco leg that's just a plain old voice call. Under current law, a phone call can be either "telephone exchange service" or "exchange access service". The former is basically taken to mean a local call, though the legal definition is a bit more expansive. The latter is taken to be the local phone company's leg of a toll call (what AT&T or MCI buys). Guess which one costs more.

    Now if all VoIP calls were treated as local ("telephone exchange service"), then the local telephone companies (think: Bells) would lose money that they now make from exchange access service ("switched access"). And the rural phone companies, who charge the long distance companies MUCH more than the Bells for that service, in order to compensate for higher costs (that is, to subsidize local service to the sticks), are very protective of switched access revenues. And the flyover states each have two senators.

    So the main issue will come up around the far end of a Vonage call, for instance -- if Vonage is a long-distance company, they will have to pay access when they deliver a long distance call. Just like other long distance companies. Skype's on-net calls, and FWD, won't be touched as long as they are on net. Count on it.

    Ideally, the whole access thing would go away, and the distinction between access and local would be moot. That's the way it works in msot of Europe, I think -- it's an American tradition to classify things to death, and let the lawyers litigate like crazy over the classification. How many billable lawyer hours do you think this case will be worth in Washington?

  5. questions by Parsec · · Score: 4, Interesting

    1. Why do we want to use a number to contact a specific phone instead of alphanumerics to contact a person like an email address? When we use a phone, are we trying to contact another phone, or a person? Unless it's a business line, isn't it usually a specific person we're trying to reach?

    2. How long until we start getting VoIP spam?