Bell VoIP Hype

from the press-release-announcements dept

VoIP is hot these days. It seems like you can't go a few hours without seeing some major announcement about some new or old company offering voice over internet phone calls. While they've dabbled with it in the past, the big telephone companies have mostly avoided the VoIP world, knowing that it will change the way they have to do business. This probably made sense for a while since there was a lot more hype than substance to the market. However, now the Bells are realizing they need to do something, so they've started announcing their own VoIP plans - which appear to be good press release material, but not much else. They're basically doing this for two reasons: to get some statement on record about how they're moving to VoIP and to set up a small trial somewhere while they watch and wait and hope that VoIP doesn't eat the bottom out of their core business just yet. It will be interesting to see how they respond if it does start to take a noticeable chunk out of their business. Most businesses, despite whatever they say publicly, react badly when a new technology challenges their cash cow. If the Bells are really preparing for these changes, it would be impressive. So far, though, it seems like more window dressing than reality.

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