VOIP, The Traditional Telephony Killer?

FrenchyinOntario writes "According to an article on IT World Canada's web site, an Ontario-based technology research firm says that 23% of small-to-medium-sized businesses have already implemented VOIP technology, and that traditional telephony companies need to adapt or die (big surprise there!) in order to remain viable. I don't necessarily agree with research analyst's George Goodall's claim that "It may be too late," since VOIP still suffers from troubling security issues as well as the possibility of SPITstorms. It's still too early to tell whether it will be a rehash of ten years ago when the telephone companies (even before the rise of the ILECS after the 1996 Telecom Reform Act) pishposhed the rising popularity of the Internet until they jumped onboard at the last minute."

Comments

Traditional telephones can die but FCC prevents it

[Anonymous Coward]

With low power FHSS .. cell phones can all be WiFi style and routed over the net or each other .. there's a MIT paper on it.

Cell phone companies can be bypassed.

Re:Traditional telephones can die but FCC prevents

[ciroknight]

I think the people of America are finding that our government isn't working for us, and we're quite often doing things that are marked as "illegal" anyways, not because of ignorance of the law, but more because of a feeling that the law is not fair. Case and point of the above is file sharing.

But, I'm not going to go off into that tangent. Instead I'm going to say that we're going to find wireless archetectures being thrown up everywhere until we get to the point that our archetecture overthrows the one the government's trying to provide for us. Of course, cease and desist letters will fly from the government, but I believe that people simply won't listen for the same reason we don't listen to their filesharing BS.

People want to be connected. This is self-evident by the invention of conventional transporation and cellular telephones. The infrastructure for it is already in place through other infrastructures. I think the biggest problem we're about to run into is federal monopoly laws running aground with the Cable companies. Recently they just passed a law saying that broadband over cable is information only and non-telecommunication.

It's really time we stand up for what we want, and what we feel is right, and I think in a weird and obscure way, technology will enable us, and disable us. Pieces of technology will let us explain what we want in crystal clarity. Others will lock us down to biometrics and GPS devices. It's really time we start rewriting the Constitution to deal with these things.

VOIP over Non-corporate VPN

[Bimo_Dude]

I have been considering setting up VPNs with my friends internationally, then putting an asterisk box on everybody's local network. Then, we can just call each other's extensions nad not have to pay for the international calls. That's similar to what the major corporations do, so us "little people" should too. Just bypass the telcos altogether. :)

Re:VOIP over Non-corporate VPN

[bfree]

• Why the VPN?
• Why do you need more then one asterisk box
• Why don't we all join the one network ... and kill Skype (dundi may be the answer)

When they get QoS, it will succeed

[davidwr]

Businesses need "as good as copper - or better."

A VoIP company that can provide guarenteed quality of service plus 911 will be an even match for phones. If this service isn't here yet it's coming soon.

The third issue of VoIP - dependence on AC power - isn't as big an issue since many businesses already depend on power for their digital phone systems anyways. Cell phones are good enough for calling the electric company to report an outage.

Here's what I see happening:

Big-boy long distance networks will team up with ISPs to have "VoIP to your ISP, then use our QoS-enabled data networks to do the long haul at a rock-bottom price, terminating at a PSTN switch or the destination's ISP." Because it's VoIP, it won't be taxed as highly as PSTN. Because it has QoS guarentees, it meets the needs of businesses. Did I say team up with? In these days of mega-mergers, your IP provider and your LD provider may be one in the same.

Hehe :)

[Mac Degger]

I'll tell you one thing. It was about the turn of the millenium maybe, maybe 2001 at the latest, and I had a friend doing his thesis at the strategic center of KPN (dutch telecom, the one which had the monopoly). When I first told him about VoIP, and how I thought that a few hackers (in the old sence of the word) could kill the traditional telecoms by setting up a few (yeah, I know) Wifi nodes per city, using cable only for city-to-city and trans continental transmission, gues what his first response was.

First off, that department he was working in, which made strategic decisions for the company, had never heard of VoIP. But his first response was this: 'Well, isn't that illegal?' And he was serious. Even a slight monologue on the free part of the spectrum didn't convince him.

Ever since, I've been forwarding articles like this to him :P

What is a SPITstorm?

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

What is a SPITstorm?

Google on spitstorm and voip returns nothing, not a single hit.

Re:VoIP not a small business solution

[jshackney]

My former employer, a small community college switched their system to the Cisco
VoIP hardware. It was rare when a student could actually get through to me, so I gave all my students my cell number instead.

The VoIP phone worked intermittently at best. The worst thing about it was that when (not if) there was a network problem the phones were completely useless.

I'm not even convinced it's good enough for my home yet.

regarding 911 and small business

[Anonymous Coward]

I've had my Vonage service for over 2 years now. No interruption in service, and my 911 has worked fine for as long as I have had the service. If you can't read that you need to register your address to get 911 to work....well, maybe you are too stupid to live anyway.
And yeah, what that other guy said about cell service, once it is wifi...

For small business....why not, as long as you have the upstream to handle it, go for it. Considering most small business in the US anyway consist of less then 50 employees for the most part, again, why not. As long as the bandwidth is there to accomodate the useage that will be there there would be zero detriment to voice quality.

Then again if those businesses were given proper advice and had their networks setup and properly managed for them, if they need to rely on them, this would pose little to no problem.

I work for an ISP and can tell you that most small businesses are still too cheap to pay up for a business connection and try to run their business needs off of standard residential cable and DSL connections. As I scratch my chin and think of all THOSE cheap arses, VOIP is perfect, they honestly THINK that a cable connection to their pizza shop or whatever novelty screwup business they are running makes them appear more professional because they can get their e-mail in 10 seconds instead of 30. They rarely if ever are using any bandwidth, why not use that for VOIP. Then those same small businesses that are pinching every penny don't have to deal with the telco's at all, and if you are THAT paranoid why not just forward the calls to a backup business cell phone *IF there is an outtage.

If you are a larger business that actually has a budget, then you should have an IT dept/service that can properly advise you on the needs you would have to accomodate such an endevour, and chances are you have more then a cable/DSL modem to service your bandwidth needs.

Now I shall return back to my beer

The article is about business solutions...

[HockeyPuck]

...Not about home users. At work you've got a 100Mb lan... at home you've got a 6Mb down 1Mb up (if you're lucky), and you're pretty far (latency) from wherever you are calling, and I doubt that the routers/switches your provider are configured to give your voice traffic good QOS.

However, in a business, you do configure VOIP traffic to have higher COS.

Maybe home VOIP traffic isn't there yet, but as a business solution, its pretty slick. Phones are upgraded by centralized management. Heck one day I had a 'camera icon' on my phone display, and the next day I could order 'ball camera' and now if i call somebody we can set up video conferencing.

Moving phones involves carrying it with you to your new location. Heck, I can even use my PC at home to act as my desk phone by using SoftPhone and my VPN. People call my desk phone and my computer rings.

Anybody tried this with a PBX based system?

You may not have a choice

[wirefarm]

I live in Japan, so a lot of my landline calls up until last year were overseas.
Even before I was using VoIP, (Skype where I can,) it turned out that a lot of the long distance providers were using VoIP to route the calls and the quality was simply terrible.
It was so bad that I would have to keep trying different services until I found one that wasn't overloaded and dropping parts of the conversation all over the place.
It won't be long before they're doing that for local calls here as well.

Now, for 90% of the calls back home, I use Skype and the quality is excellent. Sure, most of it is Skype to Skype, but the benefit of that is that Presence is added and I actually know that the person is around and available to talk, as I usually send a quick text message before initiating a voice call.

If the local telcos demand reliable 911 access, they should pay for an emergency-only phone that uses copper to be put into every location that requires it. It should be red and maybe inside a glass case like a fire extinguisher. No buttons, either, just pick it up and you're connected to an operator.

some clarification on the RBOCs and 1996; and VoIP

[jsailor]

The RBOCs didn't miss the boat and jump in at the last minute, they slowed the industry and got in cheap. They had a war chest full of cash and the upstart IP and DSL providers didn't. By continually making it extremely difficult for CLECs to access their copper facilities, the RBOCs made providing DSL a slow, expensive process - which in turn made it a horrible product for consumers. (Any guesses why cable modems flourished much earlier than DSL?) After the RBOCs starved out the CLECs, waited out the IP providers, tortured the IP equipment providers, and studied their operational models, the RBOCs began building and acquiring IP networks in earnest and at a small fraction of the cost.
In their minds and business models, they had to slow the adoption of broadband because they hadn't depreciated the 5E's they bought to handle the surge of modem lines. (They were forced by regulations to support POTS lines).

Believing that they were to dumb and arrogant to recognize that the Internet existed is just false. The RBOCs/ILECs sold the damn modem lines and local loops for T1's and T3's that the Internet ran over. They knew it was there and they knew it was too fast moving and expensive for them to engage in. So they starved their competition and waited out the storm.

Don't expect VoIP to be much different. Most RBOC and IXCs are offering some form of VoIP now.

Also, the VoIP that most people are commenting on is not what the article is referring to. It's talking about in-house IP-PBX's not IP Centrex or similar. Examples of an IP PBX are Cisco's Call Manager, Nortel Business Communications Manager (BCM), Avaya's IP office or Communications Managere, etc., etc.

Also, EVERY major PBX manufacturer is and has been focused on VOIP for some time now. NONE of them are developing TDM features, phones, etc. At the last VoiceCon vendors were asked whether they would even sell a non-IP system.

In summary, I found the article and commentary to be relatively wanton and uninformed.

Re:Cellphones

[ThJ]

As I've understood it, Norway's POTS is all IP-based down to every single local exchange, with analog/ISDN to each house, and I imagine that's pretty much the case in USA and other developed countries too. The step to VoIP from that isn't too huge...

VOIP Quality Concerns

[CokeJunky]

My company gave it a shot, and in two months switched back to traditional telephone lines. The problem we faced is that the small provider we were working with could not provide the proverbial 5 9's of uptime -- that is to say that even once we picked up the phone and did not have a dial tone. Telephones truly are critical in this business world -- the our internet connection could go down for an afternoon and it's only an annoyance. When the phone goes down an afternoon, its thousands of dollars of business. I strongly believe VOIP providers need the same level of regulation and responsibility as traditional providers because telephone is usually the first and most important link to emergency services, business contacts, friends and family, etc.

Three Different SPIT problems

[billstewart]

• Really Cheap Global Calling - Nigerians can call you for nearly free. Telemarketers who aren't total scammers can also call you for nearly free (the telco costs are already much less than US minimum wage, but foreign workers can be cheaper.) US Don't-Call-List laws don't have jurisdiction over non-US call centers, though they do cut down on the products that can be sold that way. A couple of years ago I got a call from a Nigerian Scammer using the Deaf Relay Operator services (which are free, and have Internet support) - apparently those services have cut back on fraudulent abuse, but VOIP is still dirt cheap and getting cheaper.
• Hiding call origins - CallerID is already *so* easy to fake out, and VOIP is likely to mean that calls appear to come from some local number near you instead of from wherever the spammer really lives. Sure, there's a bill, but even if it's not just a bulk bill from the telco to the VOIP company, it'll just show the equivalent of a bought-for-cash phone card, essentially untraceable.
• Direct VOIP-to-VOIP calls - As VOIP systems become more interoperable, direct calls will become increasingly possible, and we'll have to build the equivalent of spam filters and anti-spammer-block-lists for VOIP to deal with it because it will be easier to automate things than it is in the current telco network. Business systems like your PBX may take a bit longer to be compatible, but consumer-oriented systems like Skype and Vonage and such already support user-to-user calls for free. Just wait until Skype gets reverse-engineered a bit more... and the SIP-based systems are already designed for openness.

Re:Cellphones

[Dionysus]

Actually, I don't think it is. Just read the report that Telenor is moving to IP from ATM here

Telcos are throwing that away SLOWLY

[billstewart]

Disclaimer: I work for a telecom company, but this is my personal opinion only, except on the rare occasions when they have the good sense to take my advice. The question isn't whether somebody's going to eat our lunch - it's just who, and whether we're going to help them. Moore's Law has been trashing the whole computer industry's infrastructure for years; why should the telcos be any different, just because we used to be able to design for 40-year equipment lifetimes instead of 4-year?

VOIP could replace the telco infrastructure with something that would be far cheaper, simpler, and almost as reliable, if only you could build it from scratch without needing to talk to traditional phones. Doing a smooth transition is much much harder, and of course it's not clear that the traditional telcos would make the money, so they're desperately trying to find ways to do that, such as becoming Internet carriers and buying cellphone companies.

The big things driving the current telco infrastructure are

• Historical evolution from far older generations of hardware with a lot less CPU power than a good digital watch (My first draft had said "horsepower", but electromechanical switches really did have a lot of horsepower...)
• Regulatory infrastructures of who pays what money to whom which made sense in the old architectures and don't make much sense today
• Reliability and scalability that have been high priorities and have a lot of effort put into them. The Internet today carries a lot more bits than the phone network - but that doesn't mean that it's easy to scale a large call center, or that it's easy to scale a SIP server network to support a continent, or that ENUM's model of using DNS is the right way to handle directory lookups (though it's certainly more scalable than a big honking LDAP server.) And gateways between the two sides are harder to scale than either side's internal connections.
• Evolution of business data communications, because that's where much of the money is for infrastructure change. To some extent, consumer Internet matters also, because that puts some kinds of wires to people's houses.
• Lack of decent radio support for traditional telephony, because the FCC gave out separate quasi-monopolies to the telcos and the radio broadcasting companies back when FDR knew that government was the best way to manage industry. It prevented development of good crossover solutions for decades, though Moore's Law was catching up with us by the time the FCC started to get out of the way.
• Difficulty of scaling radio-based Internet access as a telco access line replacement. 802.11 is a fun solution for hobbyists, and a really nice solution for wandering laptops in coffee-shops, but it's harder than you'd think to build a cost-effective scalable replacement for telco access. 802.16 WiMAX will help some of the problems, but people will suck down bandwidth as fast as it's built - you're not limited to the amount of VOIP bits a cellphone replacement would use. Wireless last-500-meter solutions with a cable TV sized infrastructure feeding them could be an interesting replacement, though.
• Creativity. There's never enough of that stuff to go around.