Slashdot Mirror
VoIP Legal Status Worldwide?
Cigarra writes "There was much public debate going on during the last several months here in Paraguay, regarding the 'liberation of Internet,' that is, the lifting of the restriction on ISPs to connect directly to international carriers. Up until this week, they were forced to hire wholesale service from the State run telco, Copaco. During the last month, when the new regulation was almost ready, the real reason supporting the monopoly made it to the headlines: Copaco would fight for the monopoly, fearing VoIP based telephony. Finally, the regulator Conatel resolved today to end the monopoly, but a ruling on VoIP legal status was postponed for 'further study.' I guess this kind of 'problem' arose almost everywhere else in the world, so I ask the international slashdotters crowd: what is VoIP's legal status in your country / state / region? How well did incumbent telcos adapt to it, and overall, just how disruptive was this technology to established operators?"
But I don't know how much longer it'll be allowed to live by the ISPs.
I'd be much more concerned how much longer it will be allowed to live by the government. Right now just about every ISP offers a VOIP service of their own. There might be a danger that it'd cost more to use a third party VOIP than your ISPs bundled VOIP service, but it's highly unlikely that an ISP would ever kill VOIP since it'd kill their own service.
With the "government is here to protect you" crowd in power, we can expect the government to start cracking down on freedom in an effort to "protect" us from the dangers of the Internet. Will VOIP be harmed in that? I doubt it would be directly targeted, but it might be a casualty of the inevitable anti-P2P regulations that we'll see under the Democrats. (Don't forget, Obama was basically elected by the media. The popular vote nominated Hillary Clinton, but thanks to media interference, the DNC didn't even bother actually counting the votes, they just nominated Obama directly. There's pay-back due for that, just wait.)
When Bush was in office, I wouldn't have even blinked in surprise if I were told suddenly the ISPs decided that all YouTube traffic is now set to 14.4k speeds unless you pay more for it, but now that Obama's in office, its actually a debate rather than a eventuality.
And when Bush was in office, I could afford to pay a bit more for it. With Change McHopey in office? Maybe he'll just raise taxes on those durned successful business people (a.k.a. employers) and let the government cover the cost of Internet access.
Aren't you forgetting about the Net Neutrality issues, that could (if not do)
disrupt VoIP for some Canadians?
CBC podcasts mention a coming / recent gov't consultation, in which ISP's are
demanding that Net Neutrality not burden them any more, in future.
I seem to recall Obama being in favor of reducing the power and influence of lobbyists on political decisions. I'm not overly naive, but it might just be possible (maybe!) that you'll (meaning we'll) see some real change.
You moonbats really think Hussein Obama will be different eh? Get your head outta your asses, take a look at the stock market SINCE he took office. If you had a job and a 401(k), you'd absolutely have a different view of the Messiah.
You are absolutely naive.
How's your German? or Russian? What, still speaking English? Still able to open you big stupid mouth and not get thrown in prison and/or shot? Oh, that's right, you're just another spoiled, naive, and unappreciative jerk off.
I'm sorry, I try really hard not to feed the trolls...