foneScoop

February 2009

December's newsletter looked at the possible end to free content on the internet with new, easy to use payment platforms being developed for use by sites or bloggers that choose to charge for information.

This month sees a fresh reason for advocates of a free, democratic internet to argue their case as mobile networks struggle with the issue of allowing Skype to be available to their customers.  Skype, the voice-over-internet phone service, is blocked on mobile networks in the United States, and is only carried by the company 3 in certain parts of Europe.  Many cellular operators still block its calls, while other carriers impose fees to undermine Skype's attraction.

As the number of internet-ready mobile phones are set to exceed the number of computers in the world by 2013 (Gartner research), the validity of restricting internet-calling systems like Skype and Google-Voice will inevitably come under scrutiny.

Intenet phone call providers are seen by most network equipment makers and operators as unfairly robbing their customers while they invest considerable dollars to build and upgrade their networks.  Yet before a European Parliament on January 14, Ms Neelie Kroes, the new commissioner for digital issues, stated that blocking VoIP violated network neutrality, while Dario Talmesio of London-based Informa Telecoms & Media asserted, "Blocking VoIP is a short-sighted strategy."

Clearly network operators and equipment makers must ready themselves to facilitate and work with internet-calling services like Google-Voice and Skype, developing strategies to profit from the alliance.  As chief executive of network equipment maker Alcatel-Lucent, Ben Verwaayen, says, "VoIP is a great technology, but it is not a game-changer.  If everything is free, then operators will not be able to survive.  The battle is not about technology but the business model."

At Fonebox, as we aim to introduce mobile services to our customers in the near future, we couldn't agree more.