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September 01, 2006
Andy Abramson: The Future is Purple
After reading Andy’s: Requiem For The Future of VoIP, I agree that the future of VoIP is “Purple.” For the record, while “Purple Minutes” is something that I’ve been taking about since the Spring of 2002, we still have a long way to go before most consumers will get to experience this future.
These days most Voice over Broadband service providers are more focused on using VoIP to deliver “replacement and substitute” of PSTN services rather than innovate on the platform and deliver to consumers services that were never before practical or possible using the older TDM based PSTN. These service providers have chosen to ignore the fact that on the broadband internet “Voice is just an Application.” It turns out many of the Voice over Broadband companies operating in 2006 are in effect playing in the game of arbitrage, except instead of arbitraging long distance termination which was common place in the late 90’s, they are arbitraging local phone service. These are the same companies who are now dealing with the realities of VoIP compliance issues as a result of the FCC mandates from the past year and half.
This said, I have also been a fan of AOL’s Total Talk service and the people who are behind the vision, since the team at AOL understands what it means that “voice is an application” and they have, more than others, taken an active role in leveraging their IP based platform in the creation and delivery of communication services. If what Om is suggesting is true, then it is simply a case of market timing. Timing is everything. And being too early or too late into a market is never a good thing.
When I look to the future of IP Communications, I believe that one day we will start to see service providers who “get it” and who may decide to offer their customers the ability to help define and manage their call flows and set the rules for how to find a customer in the event of a “ring no answer” condition.
One day in the near future I believe it will become commonplace that people who own cell phones who are outside of their service areas will be offered a soft phone by their service provider that in a broadband network will map to their cell phone number such that if their cell phone is being called, they can answer it on their PC, PDA or preferred broadband communication device. The same device when used will allow this consumer to place an outgoing call as if he were on his cell phone. I also believe that consumers who choose to keep a wireline phone in their home will also one day have a soft phone available to them so that when they travel, they can have the ability to answer their home phone remotely on an IP network, and will even be able to initiate a call as if they were in their home, again over a broadband communications device. (I’m not sure Cable Companies will ever offer nomadic voice services.) While I believe this is a future we will experience, I’m not quite sure exactly when this will happen…but it will. Or at least it should.
In the end, after thinking about all of these possible future scenarios, one of the conclusions that I will be sharing in 11 days at Fall 2006 VON is that “in the end, the PSTN is not ever going away and that the future PSTN is IP based. Deal with it!”
Tags: Om Malik, VoIP, Andy Abramson, VON, Jeff Pulver
Posted by jeff on September 1, 2006 09:26 PM | Permalink
Additional resources: #140conf events | Watch the Jeff Pulver Show | Jeff's Qik Videos
Comments
If we're talking about the Big Bells, the operational phrase should be "one day in the future" for a softphone supplement. "Near future" implies that there's some speed and urgency going on that just isn't there...
Posted by: Doug Mohney at September 4, 2006 04:33 PM
re: post title: Heh, just don’t let Orange hear this :D
Posted by: Ralesk / Henrik Pauli at September 2, 2006 09:13 AM