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Australia Trials Phone To IP Service

Posted by Zonk on from the telemarketers-only-get-access-to-my-email-spam dept.

daria42 writes "Australia is doing trial runs with a technology which could connect conventional phone numbers with Web pages, Internet fax services and other online resources. Subscribers to an ENUM service register their other contact details, then set up rules that control how and when calls to their phone are routed. For example, calls from anybody but close family could be routed straight to voicemail between 6pm and 11pm. Because it connects to any IP service, incoming callers could also use phone numbers to access Web sites, the Skype VoIP application, faxes and other applications."

15 of 76 comments (clear)

  1. VoIP will be dead in 6 months! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Sure, go ahead and laugh at me. You think that VoIP is going to take over the world and put the phone company out of business, and I am some clueless nutcase. Right?

    The fact is that the popularity and ubiquity of VoIP is going to increase because of all the hype. But hype won't be able to overcome the fact that quality isn't as good as the PSTN. Hype won't be able to hide that 911 loaction can't work without seriously impairing theusefullness of VoIP. And, most important of all, hype won't be able to hide the security problems with VoIP.

    How long are you going to continue using VoIP when some script kiddie that you pissed off on IRC DDoSes your phone? Who's going to keep on using VoIP when the latest Outlook worm prevents them form making phone calls for the next two days? Who's going to keep VoIP when they realize that I, or anyone else can listen in on their calls right this minute?

    VoIP is great. I use it right now. But, I haven't cut the PSTN cord and I won't cut the PSTN cord for VoIP. It's just too dangerous and it'll only be another 6 months before disaster strikes and everyone realizes how dangerous it is.

    Think about it; 'Hello? Police? this is ...'. Script Kiddie says; 'Har har, I r0xorz!!!'

    6 Months

  2. Thank you for... by pintpusher · · Score: 2, Funny

    calling Google. Due to unusually heavy call volume your search will not be executed for approximately .31 seconds. We appreciate your call, please stay online for the next available operator.

    "Thank you for calling Google, how can I help you?"

    "ummm... hi... I'd like to search for anime boobs"

    "Alright, lets see here is the first result out of 807,000 in .31 seconds. Anime Pics. drink my piss hentai pokemon free asian videos. Rikku hentai anime demons inuyasha hentai, hardcore nude anime boobs free shit eating pics. ...
    humman-traffic.erospace.pl/hentai/anime-pics. html - 10k - May 4, 2005 - Cached - Similar pages" ... I don't get it. Wouldn't be easier just to browse to a website?

    --
    man, I feel like mold.
    1. Re:Thank you for... by generic-man · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Google used to have a search by telephone service where you called in, said a series of search terms, and watched a results page refresh. Looks like they've taken it down, though.

      --
      For more information, click here.
    2. Re:Thank you for... by pintpusher · · Score: 2, Funny

      I guess I really don't see the point, unless you can't type? or maybe you want to provide a search page for someone else?

      Seems more like wow that's cool factor than anything of use.

      I'm waiting for the day when I can pick up the mouse, and in a scottish brogue say "Computer? Computer!?" and get a response...

      --
      man, I feel like mold.
  3. Re:Adventures in improper English, part 86 by generic-man · · Score: 2, Funny

    Do you have some bandwidth this afternoon? I'd like to action a go-round to trial a proposal with you. The key is to be proactive in such a paradigm.

    --
    For more information, click here.
  4. Hypothetical SPAMMER Scenario by LegendOfLink · · Score: 4, Funny

    You: *picks up phone* Hello?

    SPAMMER: Hey Buddy, your woman wants a big one.

    You: What?! Who is this? Remove me from your... *beeping* Oh wait a sec, I've got a another call. *click* Hello?

    SPAMMER 2: Hi, this is Charles Taylor from Liberia, I need to use your bank account...

    You: WTF!? STOP..*beep beep* Hold on. *click*

    SPAMMER 3: Hi, thanks for the advice. Could you open this file immediately?

    --
    IGB: More fun than eating oatmeal!
  5. Re:Should be easy... by Avyakata · · Score: 2, Funny

    wtf mate?

    Actually...I highly doubt many people around here have actually ever seen that endless amusing flash cartoon...

    There goes my karma...

  6. Crikey! An ENUM e164.arpa FAQ by rewinn · · Score: 2, Informative
    http://www.enum.com.au/faqs.htm answered a lot of questions

    (I'm not gonna pretend that I understood all the answers ...)

    --
    --- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
  7. Wrong Way by Phat_Tony · · Score: 2, Insightful
    This is neat, but they're going the wrong direction. Memorizing a 10-digit number instead of the word "Google" isn't making things much easier for people

    I want the opposite: I want my phone number to be arbitrary text of my choosing. I want the whole phone system to use good voice recognition, so that any time I want to call anyone, if I can remember their phone-moniker, all I have to do is say it into the phone. A DNS-like system will go reference this to their actual phone number, IP address, or whatever address and protocol they choose to use for voice communications, and connect me.

    --
    Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
    1. Re:Wrong Way by wackysootroom · · Score: 2, Informative

      Memorizing a 10-digit number instead of the word "Google" isn't making things much easier for people

      That's not really all that ENUM does. ENUM isn't grown up yet, but think of it as a DNS for phone numbers and then some. You wouldn't want to have to type in the IP address every time you wanted to view a web page, would you? ENUM does the same for telephony as DNS does for the web. The strongest use of ENUM, IMHO will be the ability to "follow" someone no matter what phone they're on based upon the rules they set up with their ENUM service. If ENUM matures enough and is widely accepted, you won't need to know a persons home number, cell number and work number; ENUM takes care of that automatically.

      I want the opposite: I want my phone number to be arbitrary text of my choosing.

      In the future, you might be able to register a telephony domain name much the same way you can register and internet domain name.

    2. Re:Wrong Way by Phat_Tony · · Score: 2, Interesting
      Email addresses aren't a good representative for all text. I may only have four or five email addresses memorized (although that's due in good measure to the fact that my email program knows them all and associates them with names and nicknames in its own DNS-like system), but I have hundreds of website addresses memorized, compared to only a couple of dozen phone numbers. Look at how many people's names a person knows, or at their vocabularies, compared to how many numbers they have memorized. I stand by the idea that words and names are easier to memorize than long strings of numbers.

      Email addresses are bad, and I think there are a number of reasons for that. Primarily, they are almost always at some arbitrary seeming domain- uchicago.edu, columbus.rr.com, insighttelco.net. etc. These are hopeless to remember. Also, a lot of email addresses are assigned, or chosen poorly. For example, at Chicago, it was first initial, middle initial, first 5 letters of last name. How stupid is that to remember, among each of a bijillion other arbitrary systems?

      But if you choose your own, and don't have any domain (or the domain for all of them is "phone" or something), then you don't have that problem.

      --
      Can anyone tell me how to set my sig on Slashdot?
  8. Agreed. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    People don't seem to realize that the phone companies have been using VoIP for years! That's right, Verizon was using VoIP in large scale production more than five years ago and so were many other phone companies. But, they were using it over their own private lines, not the Wild Wild West internet.

    VoiP cannot be reliable over a shared medium where there is no control. The phone companies know this already and the consumer and Vonages of the world are about to find out too. At that point, everyone will come running back to the phone companies and they will find that the phone company is either gone or is ready to REALLY stick it to them.

    People expect 5 nines(99.999%) reliability because that is what the phone company has provided for the past 40 or more years. They will be shocked to find out that their internet connection is only about 95% reliable. That's one and a half nines. There is no way that people will put up with a phone that is less reliable than a cell phone, even if it is dirt cheap!

  9. DUNDi by kalugen · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Also relevant: http://www.dundi.com/
    "DUNDi is a peer-to-peer system for locating Internet gateways to telephony services. Unlike traditional centralized services (such as the remarkably simple and concise ENUM standard), DUNDi is fully-distributed with no centralized authority whatsoever."

  10. Been there... by c_g_hills · · Score: 2, Informative

    It's not normally Australia lagging behind, but the UK have already done this and produced a report. Particularly of note is the assertion that there needs to be a process put in place to identify who actually owns each number. The telcos cannot be relied upon because they are either lazy, or simply do not want to lose a revenue stream.

  11. Re:Adventures in improper English, part 86 by sbaker · · Score: 2, Funny

    Nonsense! You can verb any word in the English language.

    --
    www.sjbaker.org