[asterisk-biz] Free DIDs

[Nitzan Kon]

--- On Sun, 8/16/09, Trixter aka Bret McDanel <trixter at 0xdecafbad.com> wrote:

> American Idol does their voting, or at least did, with
> early media only to avoid the MOU charges.

That's classic abuse. They in essence get millions(?) of
calls, get what they need to get done, and neither the
user nor America Idol pays for the call. Meanwhile the
carriers delivering the calls have significant costs to
deliver them.

> They said its on the carriers to charge what it costs 
> and not whine because they sold service for below their
> cost and lost money.  Their contracts and tariffs need 
> to include protections against losing money.  

Well, what we did is target and exclude some conference
services from our free-calling plans. If users want to
use those "for free" they should be the ones paying for it.
This is more of a band-aid than a real solution though,
and it's definitely not good for user moral. They usually
understand it after they realize those chat services really
aren't free, but the fact that we have to explain it in the
first place is a waste of our time.

> All of the complaints about arbitrage is that its unfair
> that some company can advertise a rate below their cost 
> and they end up losing money over it.

When I price a calling plan, I account for the majority
of the calls. The majority of calls cost a fraction of
a cent. When so-called "free" conference services cost
10 times that and artificially inflate the average per
minute price - I don't see why I should raise my prices
to match. I'd rather just ban or exclude those services
from the calling plan. It doesn't make sense for the
user too - why would they want their calling plan to
double in price?

You're biased because you operate such a service, and I
agree that it's LEGAL - but dealing with it is a PITA
for carriers.

> or under-pricing minutes and then complaining that people 
> actually used the service.

So basically, we all should triple our rates, just so a
few rural chat lines can keep their profit stream? I don't
think so.