BETA Testers needed for MyGlobalTalk.com: a cheap cellular international LD service

"George" <george@nospam.invalid> wrote in message
news:q6qdnbRjyKufV1PanZ2dnUVZ_hSdnZ2d@comcast.com. ..
>> They still offer dial-up service with their goofy proprietary software,
>> but
>> now at PeoplePC/Netzero type pricing- $10/month.
>>
>>
>>
> Maybe, but I would be embarrassed to be "someone@aol.com".

That's your hangup. I've been someone@aol.com for 15 years. I know it
lacks geek snob appeal in tech circles. I have those friends too- you know-
the ones that used to e-mail you every six months with their new e-mail
address so you could update your contact info for them.

I try to balance the emotional baggage of having "aol" in my e-mail address
with the fact that people who haven't contacted me since the current
President's father was in office still can. ;-)

Todd Allcock wrote:

> Because they're selling it under cost! Interconnect fees to US
> landlines run $0.01 (metro) to $0.05 (VERY rural)/minute. Incoming also
> costs you if you don't own your number pool (and Skype doesn't.) DID
> rentals run $1-3/month wholesale depending on the desirability of the
> area code/prefix. You CAN'T run a VoIP business with $20-60/year
> unlimited and make money, unless it comes from elsewhere- like
> MagicJack's supposed ad revenue. Now Skype might do it as a loss leader
> for eBay's integrated Skype "buyer/seller connection" services. eBay
> might figure Skype's low rates will attract more Skype users and
> facilitate more eBay transactions, etc. but that's a pretty thin
> business plan as well.

The money they paid for Skype is long gone, and the costs of keeping it
running are pretty low. The money they lose on Skype is lost in the
noise. This is good for Skype users, because the company could not
survive on its own.

The big problem with Skype, IMVAIO are a) per minute costs are much
higher than other providers, even though the unlimited service is a good
deal for big talkers, b) proprietary hardware, c) you have to have a PC
running to use it.

It was interesting to use Skype when they had free Skype-Out, but it
wasn't worth a higher price than free. Still, Skype to Skype is a great
deal for those that want to engage in endless gabfests. One place that
it could result in big savings is for conference calls. It's easy to
spend thousands of dollars a week on conference calls, and often the
calls are between remote offices of the same company that could easily
all use Skype.

On 2008-03-05, Larry <noone@home.com> wrote:
> SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in news:47cea9a9$0$36367
> $742ec2ed@news.sonic.net:
>
>> Skype (other than free Skype to Skype calls) is a not a great deal
>> compared to other VOIP providers. It _does_ remind me of AOL (is AOL
>> even still around, I no longer get any CDs from them?).
>>
>>
>
> How much are you paying for incoming and outgoing VoIP per month to call
> any phone/sellphone in the USA/Canada with virtually unlimited service?
>
> If I only had the one phone number, here, it would be $5/month with no
> other fees/tax loads/connection fees or other nonsense.
>
> (Someone's bound to mention Skype's imposable fair use "limit" of 3000
> minutes per month. This is reserved by Skype, but, so far, is not
> enforced. I know Skypers using twice that much that haven't been charged
> extra.

Who? My Skype, with Skype Pro, starts charging for calls automatically
when you pass 3000 minutes, and the Skype forums are full of complaints
about the same thing. Here's a recent one:

http://forum.skype.com/index.php?showtopic=110480

The people you know who ran past 3000 minutes probably had the Unlimited
Calling Program which, after Verizon got their knuckles rapped, is probably
truly unlimited now. Skype doesn't sell that any more, however (Coincidence?
I think not!).

> Most won't talk over 50 hours per month, except maybe for teenage
> girls...(c;)

Speak for yourself. The people who live at my house can collectively do
that without any effort at all. If you've lived in enough places and
collected enough good friends that you want to keep in touch with it
isn't that hard.

> Is your service less than $5/month with no per minute or per connection
> fees?

Maybe it's not $5/month, but 3000 minutes isn't unlimited either (and there
should be some penalty for making knowing exactly what you are spending
the $5 for so difficult). Even for people who are unlikely to use 3000
minutes per month, the advantage of "unlimited" is that you never have to
think about it, and thinking is something I'll pay extra to avoid.

Still, I keep on with SKype since three unlimited use inbound numbers in
three countries for $9 per month is a deal I can't match elsewhere. If
I stop having a use for those, however, Skype's use for me will be down
to the occasional hotel room where the NAT/Firewall router is unfriendly
to SIP.

Dennis Ferguson

"Todd Allcock" <elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote in
news:jgBzj.8432$hg4.4935@fe107.usenetserver.com:

> Skype still hasn't figured out how to make money at VoIP despite
> giving away the farm. I don't know how true it is, but the last
> figure I read on line was that they haven't averaged a nickel per user
> per month yet. Puts that cellphone $50 ARPU in perspective!
>

I don't think Ebay bought Skype with telephone company in mind. Ebay's
core business is TRADING and Skype is a way to get EBAY SELLERS talking to
EBAY BUYERS, no matter where they are on the planet.

Do you see a plan coming together where Skype is a good thing for Ebay?

If they jack it up, people will just not use it. The VoIP market is
flooded, if you consider the ones you have to be a hacker to use. Anyone
can use Skype, like AOL, which is the whole idea. Skype-to-Skype, with
video is a no-cost, direct connection, once Skype has the current IP of the
guy you're calling.

I don't know that much about "standard" VoIP connections. I assume they
all must go through some kind of central server, right? Those servers must
be massive and expensive to maintain.

One note that might explain why it's so cheap. My Charleston inbound Skype
number is in a block of numbers used for dialup modem service, like AOL and
many others. It never gets spammed from the boiler rooms because of it.
They all think my number is just another modem. Skype has got to rent
these numbers from someone who runs the block for really cheap to even
break even. Is that how your VoIP provider works, too?

"Todd Allcock" <elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote in
news:jgBzj.8432$hg4.4935@fe107.usenetserver.com:

> But Larry, do you not see the irony that you're defending a
> (relatively) overpriced, closed, proprietary service like Skype tooth
> and nail because you believe it represents a good value to you, yet to
> crap on anyone who defends their "SELLphone" data service because
> ubiquitous mobile data represents a good value to them?
>
>
>

I just don't understand why you get your panties all in a wad because
Skype is proprietary, mentioned over and over in this message. To
users, like me, I don't care a bit how proprietary it is because I have
no investment, whatsoever, in its software (free), and have no contract
forcing me to buy it more than until next month, now that the yearly fee
bargains have been discontinued. My price went DOWN since unlimited
went away! I was paying $60/year for a phone number. That's now
$24/number with Skype Pro's $3/mo.

This has nothing to do with Sellphones, of course. I don't defend
Skype, at all, and have no pecuinary interest in whether it lives or
dies. But, I DO point out that crapware like VONAGE is way overpriced
over Skype's costs. If you're happy with simple VoIP interconnects for
$2 less than Skype with all its freebie features...I'm not dumping on
you, at all. The difference between them is 3 quarts of gas at Sunoco.
The difference in what they DO for $2 more is cool. I am stuck with a
Skype Phone I freely admit was a mistake because free wifi has gone to
webpage logons it doesn't support. That has nothing to do with which
VoIP company, just the poor design Netgear did on the Skype phone. The
N800 was purchased, initially, to cover these deficiencies on the road,
which it does, fully.

I have played with Gizmo and the other comm toys on the N800. NONE of
them is the pleasure to use the Skype software on the tablet provides.
I only miss my Skype webcam, but we get around that with Google Talk.

Merely pointing out any alternatives to what's being hawked on a thread
should never have to turn into a brawl-under-a-bridge....but sometimes
it seems it must as hotheads blow off steam.

I'm too old to care....(c;

SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote in news:47cee62f$0$36345
$742ec2ed@news.sonic.net:

> The big problem with Skype, IMVAIO are a) per minute costs are much
> higher than other providers, even though the unlimited service is a
good
> deal for big talkers, b) proprietary hardware, c) you have to have a
PC
> running to use it.
>
> It was interesting to use Skype when they had free Skype-Out, but it
> wasn't worth a higher price than free. Still, Skype to Skype is a
great
> deal for those that want to engage in endless gabfests. One place that
> it could result in big savings is for conference calls. It's easy to
> spend thousands of dollars a week on conference calls, and often the
> calls are between remote offices of the same company that could easily
> all use Skype.
>
>

Now I'm awful confused.... Skype Pro + an incoming phone number
someplace on the planet, not necessarily at home, is $5/month in the USA
and Canada for virtually unlimited calling in N America. That's NOT
"much higher"! That's almost FREE!

b) There is no proprietary hardware necessary. You need a PC you
already have...or...a Skype-compatible PDA or Linux tablet...or...ANY
KIND OF TELEPHONE you can make calls on! You don't even NEED a
computer, any more, to use Skype!
http://www.skype.com/allfeatures/togo/
Skype-to-go is INCLUDED with Skype Pro for $3/mo.
"To Go is currently available in the Australia, Chile, Denmark, Estonia,
Finland, Ireland, New Zealand, Poland, Sweden, UK and the US."
I can pick up a phone in Ireland, call the Skype-to-go access number in
Ireland, then call at cheap Skype rates to anyplace on the planet from
my account. No proprietary hardware, except an Irish telephone, is
necessary. It will cost me 3.9c/call to start the connection, a
pittance because I'm in Ireland. If I start the call in the USA or
Canada, there's no fee because I'm a Skype Pro customer under this
terrible $3/mo financial burden and they feel sorry for me.

I can pick up the phone in your living room, call Skype-to-go, identify
myself, and call Japan for 2.1c/min FROM YOUR HOUSE PHONE, a proprietary
instrument to be sure! A 10 minute call is 21 cents! If I call New
Brunswick, there's no extra charge....FROM YOUR US OR CANADIAN PHONE!

c) You do NOT have to run a PC to use Skype out or Skype in from your
sellphone or any POTS phone. You do have to briefly operate your PC to
type in your CALL FORWARDING number so Skype In knows where to send the
incoming calls when someone dials one of your (10) incoming phone
numbers. I hardly ever run Skype on my PC or the tablet, unless I'm
making a call to the other side of the planet and want to see the video
from another Skyper for free or swap files with him/her/it. I do call
from one of the computers if I don't want the company I'm calling to
steal my caller ID so they can put me on some boiler room's call list to
be spammed to death. All caller IDs FROM Skype are 000-123-4567, no
matter who I'm calling, even the cops, IRS or FBI! I use Skype from my
Alltel sellphone all the time, both incoming and outgoing. I even have
stolen the Skype ringtones so the sellphone sounds like Skype on the
computer when someone calls me from one of my Skype In numbers...(c;

I know a small company that has Skype connected between 4 offices in
different states, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week...with full color video,
Skype's instant messaging conferences and sharing files. They never
disconnect it. I don't think they've ever paid Skype a dime as they
don't use their POTS interconnects at all that I know of. There's
probably 24 desktop computers all linked together between the 4 offices
at once....

On 2008-03-05, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote:
> "Larry" <noone@home.com> wrote in message
> news:Xns9A586A32A4074noonehomecom@208.49.80.253...
>> Skype used to be the VoIP joke....but no more. Considering all the
>> freebies Skype doesn't charge for and the really cheap in-country phone
>> services, $US0.021/min is really cheap to overseas.
>
> Comparted to AT&T, sure. Compared to the $0.011 some other VoIPs charge
> it's 100% higher!

The difference between 1.1 cents and 2.1 cents doesn't bother me much. On
the other hand I have a relative who, sometimes, can only be called on a
Trinidad & Tobago mobile phone, and that difference bothers me a lot. AT&T
landline 40 cents, Skype 34.1 cents, average long distance discounter 11
cents.

Skype seems to have stopped maintaining their price list to follow the
market; their price might have been reasonable a few years ago but not
now. I don't need the absolute cheapest prices, I don't mind paying
a bit more, but I do want someone who'll at least keep their prices in the
ballpark all over so I don't have to think about it.

>> http://www.skype.com/allfeatures/skypepro/
>> They even gave me a 60% discount on my two Skype In POTS numbers in
>> Charleston and London, this year. I don't see how they do it. It's SO
>> cheap!
>
> Because they're selling it under cost! Interconnect fees to US landlines
> run $0.01 (metro) to $0.05 (VERY rural)/minute. Incoming also costs you if
> you don't own your number pool (and Skype doesn't.)

I don't think that's actually right. There are some rural phone companies
which get to charge a very high price for access, but an FCC report I saw
a few years ago said the usage-weighted average price paid for landline
access was below 0.5 cents/minute (cell phones are free, I think) and it has
to be lower now. The plan they're currently considering has the price for
most landlines dropping to between 0.05 and 0.075 cents per minute. Inbound
calls actually earn (a tiny bit of) revenue.

The bigger charges will be what the VoIP-terminating phone company wants
for the service, and that will be entirely dependent on what kind of deal
you can negotiate with them. For big-volume users $2/month for an unlimited
DID might be reasonable (though I'd guess the reason Skype hasn't added a
new country for quite a while is that they've run out of places where the
one-price-fits-all $2 will do it) and, with the 3000 minute cap, Skype
is at least limiting their damage on the outbound side. This might be
sustainable if they get some consequential usage at their per minute
rates too.

Dennis Ferguson

"Larry" <noone@home.com> wrote in message
news:Xns9A5897C1C6CEEnoonehomecom@208.49.80.253...
>> But Larry, do you not see the irony that you're defending a
>> (relatively) overpriced, closed, proprietary service like Skype tooth
>> and nail because you believe it represents a good value to you, yet to
>> crap on anyone who defends their "SELLphone" data service because
>> ubiquitous mobile data represents a good value to them?
>
>
> I just don't understand why you get your panties all in a wad because
> Skype is proprietary, mentioned over and over in this message.

My panties aren't in a wad, I'm just explaining why Skype isn't considered
by some to be "VoIP" since VoIP typically describes the SIP standard.

It's like the difference between my WinMo phone or your N800 and a PC.
They're all useful tools, and share many of the same functions, but my phone
and your tablet aren't Intel-based computers, so they run proprietary
software designed for those devices specifically. (Yes, yours runs Linux,
but the apps have to be recompiled for the different processor and
environment. A straight Linux for PC app will not run on the N800
directly.)

> To
> users, like me, I don't care a bit how proprietary it is because I have
> no investment, whatsoever, in its software (free), and have no contract
> forcing me to buy it more than until next month, now that the yearly fee
> bargains have been discontinued.

True, but you DO have an investment in hardware, like your WiFi phones.
Unless they support the SIP protocol, you can't change VoIP providers.
(Although at least some of the WiFi phones I've seen do support SIP as
well.) Obviously the advantage of compatible VoIP hardware is that you can
choose between literally hundreds of providers competing on price. But more
importantly, SIP hardware allows you to have a "Vonage-like" home phone
service replacement at a fraction of Vonage's costs.


> My price went DOWN since unlimited
> went away! I was paying $60/year for a phone number. That's now
> $24/number with Skype Pro's $3/mo.


I'm not arguing $60/year for unlimited isn't a good deal. I just don't see
the value of Skype's extra services- I use free Skype to Skype features,
like video calling. The $5/month extra to "convert" Skype to PSTN use, IMO,
is better spent on a service that does it better- that's all.

> This has nothing to do with Sellphones, of course. I don't defend
> Skype, at all, and have no pecuinary interest in whether it lives or
> dies. But, I DO point out that crapware like VONAGE is way overpriced
> over Skype's costs. If you're happy with simple VoIP interconnects for
> $2 less than Skype with all its freebie features...I'm not dumping on
> you, at all. The difference between them is 3 quarts of gas at Sunoco.
> The difference in what they DO for $2 more is cool. I am stuck with a
> Skype Phone I freely admit was a mistake because free wifi has gone to
> webpage logons it doesn't support. That has nothing to do with which
> VoIP company, just the poor design Netgear did on the Skype phone. The
> N800 was purchased, initially, to cover these deficiencies on the road,
> which it does, fully.

Fair enough- I use my WinMo phone ofor VoIP on the road for the same reason-
better compatibility (like the N800, it can do Skype, SIP, etc.) and handles
authentication well.


> I have played with Gizmo and the other comm toys on the N800. NONE of
> them is the pleasure to use the Skype software on the tablet provides.
> I only miss my Skype webcam, but we get around that with Google Talk.

Gizmo just added video to their N800 software- you should check it out.

> Merely pointing out any alternatives to what's being hawked on a thread
> should never have to turn into a brawl-under-a-bridge....but sometimes
> it seems it must as hotheads blow off steam.
>
> I'm too old to care....(c;

Brawling wasn't my intent- you just seemed to think that the downplaying of
Skype or Mobivox on DSLR was due to some conspiracy (surprise!) or
censorship by "VoIP interests." VoIP providers aren't in some kind of
anti-Skype alliance- they're separate entities all trying to cut each
other's throats, and have no control over an independent forum either singly
or in aggregate. My point was only the rest of the VoIP-using world isn't
as enamored of Skype as you are, and other providers also provide excellent
value and good feature sets. To each his or her own... In my case, I do
use Skype for the free features, and very occasional LD use from my Skype
credits if I find myself on a hotel system that attempts to block VoIP
(times when "proprietary" is an advantage!)

"Todd Allcock" <elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote in news:GTDzj.12599
$yQ6.1111@fe109.usenetserver.com:

> Gizmo just added video to their N800 software- you should check it out.
>
>

Thanks! I'll download it and give it a whirl.....er, ah,
flip....whatever...(c;

http://www.internettablettalk.com/20...rlight-coming-
to-the-internet-tablet/

Ooops...I got sidetracked while on my way to find it. Cable TV will be on
the tablet in no time...

Nokia being HUGE isn't a bad thing at all....

On 2008-03-05, Todd Allcock <elecconnec@AmericaOnLine.com> wrote:
> Voicestick, a VoIP company with a cellular "bridge" service (you dial your
> own VoIP number from your cellphone and get a dial tone to dial
> internationally at VoIP rates) is offering free beta accounts (with $10 of
> LD credit) of their new "MyGlobalTalk" service.

I'd note that, for dial-through international long distance, I like Rebtel's
feature set a lot better. In addition to double-dialing, if you add the
overseas number you want to call as a contact they'll give you a local number
which connects to that person directly and, if the phone is in one of
the 40-something countries where they have numbers, the contact will also
get a local-to-them number to call you back on. If you are travelling and
switch your primary phone to another country, it gives you a new set of local
numbers for that country. It also gives you three ways to make a call (they
call you, you call them, or the person who is called hangs up and calls right
back, in which case Rebtel doesn't charge anything for the call) which I
actually kind of enjoy figuring out how to arbitrage against the calling
costs of the phones to minimize the overall price.

The only thing that doesn't work currently is using them for forwarding
your phones when travelling, but they're working on fixing that. If they
do I can give up my Skype DID numbers.

Rebtel's current promotion is that if you open an account and put $10
in it they'll give you $20 extra.

Some of Voicestick's prices are pretty nice, but none of their feature
sets seems to match what I want. After looking at their price list I
tried to get a T-Mobile UK SIM which had a number in the range they charge
9.4 cents to call (to port to the prepaid SIM from another company that
I like more), but I could only find prepaid SIMs with 20.3 cent numbers,
which isn't low enough to make it worth maintaining an account just for
that.

Dennis Ferguson