[Asterisk-Users] Free WWT (WorldWideTelco): Utopia, or just a matter of organization?

[Marconi Rivello]

Good points, Jon.

I know that there are legal issues that must be considered. But the
technology can't be held back because of the ignorant. The police
already has computer technicians to help with digital crimes. And the
internet and voip revolution won't stop because of the illicit ways
they can be used. The laws, and it's "imposers", must adapt to new
realities.

Anyway, these issues don't have to be addressed right now. Unless they
are actually ILLEGAL today. In the beginning, this network can't be
opened to general public, of course. It would be usable only by the
participants of the project. If we realize that it works, then
security measures must be implemented, lawyers must be consulted,
etc...

The financial argument is just too strong. Just a sample: 1 minute of
local calls here in Brazil is US$ 0.012. One minute call to US is US$
0.26, and that's because of a promotional rate. So, my girlfriend
(which is in US) calls me from her cellphone, to my home, and we only
pay the local call here in Brazil (her cell -> StanaPhone DiD or
IPKall -> my asterisk box at work -> my home). So, if I call her from
the "real" phone, it is almost 22 times more expensive. And there are
other countries with much more expensive international phone rates.

The best thing is that neither the caller nor the callee has to use
voip. Both of them can use a real phone (like me and my girlfriend).
I'm able to call my asterisk box, type my password and gain access to
SIP. This way, the caller can be identified by his/her access code
(when caller id is available, that too can be stored), and the dialed
number can be recorded for further analysis, if necessary. The thing
may be done really professionally.

Well, I'm gonna do it. I'll start looking for a website host, and
anyone willing to participate is welcome.

PS: Critics are still welcome. It is better to foresee the problem...

Marconi.

On Sun, 05 Sep 2004 00:26:52 -0400, Jon Radel <jon at radel.com> wrote:
> 
> Marconi Rivello wrote:
> > In US, local calls are free. So it wouldn't be a problem to make such
> > a network to get rid of long distance calls. But in other countries
> > (like here in Brazil) local calls are charged. So there could be some
> > king of billing (without commercial purposes, just to pay for the
> > costs), or something...
> 
> Well... actually...  There are ever fewer people left in the U.S. who
> have free local outbound calls.  Lots of people have enough calls or
> minutes included in the base monthly charge to cover their normal
> calling every month, so it sort of looks like the calls are "free."
> However, if their phone is suddenly in use 18 hours / day by people all
> over the world their bill might jump painfully.  For example, if I
> exceed my monthly allowance on my residential POTS lines with Verizon, I
> pay 9.6 cents per local call.
> 
> However, if your phone company in the U.S. ever noticed that you were
> billing or sharing your line, they'd probably make you get a more
> expensive business line, and that's if they were feeling really, really
> nice.  (A Local Exchange Carrier (LEC) not to be named here once shut
> down one of our DS-3s without notice because we thought we were
> wholesaling the capacity, in part because we were carrying VOIP across
> it.  Their lawyers turned green, and sent people with fancy titles to
> apologize, after they realized what the business office had done, but
> it, and lesser episodes, show that the LECs in the U.S. are, as a
> general rule, quite freaked out about all this VOIP and "free" phone
> call stuff.  You are messing with their revenue, you know.)
> 
> All of which pales besides how you'll feel the first time the police
> drop by to discuss a phone call placed from your phone that played a key
> role in some nasty crime.  The chances are you'd have some very long and
> very painful discussions with police officers who wouldn't know an RTP
> packet if it punched them in the nose about how a) it wasn't you, b) it
> wasn't somebody who came over to your house to use your phone, c)  you
> might be able to figure out what country the call was from if they let
> you go home and look at your logs, and d)  they should believe you and
> not the technicians from the phone company.
> 
> So, I'd second other recommendations here that do this if you must for a
> few friends you trust, but think really, really hard before you open
> something like this to the public.
> 
> --Jon Radel
>