Section 3.3. Other Features | Talk is Not Cheap!: Saving the High Costs of Misunderstandings at Work and Home

3.3. Other Features

People love features, or at least some people love as many features as they can get, while others really love a few features and don't care about the rest. Some care about no features, until they find one that directly solves a problem they have. Then they too become feature-mongers.

There are not many more features available from the traditional telephone companies that appeal to very many users. Prices vary widely between traditional telephone companies, as you can tell from the prices listed already. When you do find a service you like, you have to pay for it month after month after month.

Broadband phone services have a long list of features still to go. These next features discussed are available only from broadband phone services. The traditional telephone companies can't match the new technology with their old equipment.

3.3.1. Choose Your Area Code

This is one of the coolest advantages of broadband phones, and one that the traditional telephone companies absolutely cannot copy. Even if broadband phones cost the same or more than traditional phones (they don't, but imagine they do for this example), the ability to choose the area code for your number would make them mandatory for many people.

The nomenclature has yet to clarify, so broadband phone companies use different terms for the same service. "Virtual Numbers" means something completely different, at least in certain circles, and appears later in this chapter in the "Optional ($$) Features" section.

The great thing about this is the ability to pick your phone number from any area code served by the broadband phone company, rather than being limited to a specific geographic area as forced by the traditional telephone companies. You moved and want a phone number that's a local call from all your old friends and family back home? You got it.

Vonage calls this ability to live in Cleveland and choose a phone number that's local to San Francisco Area Code Selection. Sounds good. VoicePulse calls this Available Area Codes. BroadVoice calls it Number Availability, but don't treat any of these as gospel because marketing vice presidents will change them now and then.

The important part to remember is that your broadband phone company can provide you a phone number from anywhere in the U.S. where they have connections to the local telephone company. This is great for businesses, who want to give customers a local number to call, knowing customers won't dial long distance. It also makes the business appear local.

Limitations exist, depending on how much support your broadband phone company has throughout the United States. None of the broadband phone companies offer every U.S. area code, or even local numbers for all major cities, as of early 2005 (but that will change soon). And if you check the service areas of the various broadband phone companies, I promise you will find the cities you need are covered by one of these carriers.

Since area codes cover multiple cities (especially suburban towns), you may find your exact city doesn't have a number available but another town nearby does. Why? The traditional telephone company's central office in your exact town may not yet support your broadband phone company, or the block of numbers allocated for the broadband phone customers may all be used. This doesn't matter, because you'll get the area code you want, or at least an area code that is a local call for the area.

Note: Cold PizzaIf you call your local pizza parlor for delivery on your broadband phone, make sure they have the right city, or the pizza will be cold and the delivery charge will be horrendous when it arrives (assuming your pizza place tracks you by your phone number as mine does).

Be carefulif you have a broadband phone with a distant area code, you probably need a second phone, or at least another number for your broadband phone. Otherwise, if your neighbor calls you, it will be a long distance call for them.

Look at the map from BroadVoice in Figure 3-1, which shows the screen picking an area code. There are three funny things about this map, which I'll get to shortly.

Figure 3-1. Choosing your phone number

I'm in a suburb of Dallas called Mesquite (doesn't that sound like Texas?). My area code is 972, used in the Dallas area when the 214 area code started running out of numbers. 972 numbers are the donut around the Dallas 214 phone numbers.

My suburb's traditional telephone company's central office doesn't have any available numbers, but the central office in Carrollton does. If Dallas is a clock, then Mesquite is at three o'clock, and Carrollton is at eleven o'clock and about 45 miles away, but they're both local numbers in the Dallas area.

Okay, so what's funny? First, BroadVoice doesn't have numbers in Mesquite, but they still have some in Dallas with the 214 area code. Second, my local phone number can terminate at a central office 45 miles away, but it's all local for the broadband phone companies. Finally, my central office still carries the town name of Lawson, although Mesquite is where the central office is and where I am. I'm not even sure Lawson is still incorporated. Told you the traditional telephone companies move slowly.

You've heard the term "cut the cord" in a variety of settings. With a broadband phone, you can literally cut the cord of your local traditional telephone company and have a little piece of home (a phone) sitting on your desk far, far away.

3.3.2. Encrypted Conversations

You don't have to be Bond, James Bond, to want your conversations to remain private. The U.S. government doesn't like encrypted telephones in the hands of private citizens, but there's nothing they can do about the fact that all Skype calls are encrypted automatically.

Not only does Skype encrypt the calls, they use a seriously strong technology to do so. The Skype algorithm (computer instruction set) uses 256-bit encryption. That's four times better than the level of wireless network security you have in your home. That's more secure than almost every nonmilitary U.S. government phone encryption service.

Skype relies on the hardware power of the computer system (or PDA) processor to provide encryption at the source. They rely on the hardware power of the receiving computer (or PDA) processor on the receiving end to decrypt the voice stream and turn it back into sounds.

Note: Decrypt 'Em DannoIf you're a law enforcement official and want to eavesdrop on conversations, you hate Skype.

The phone-centric companies like Vonage do not encrypt their voice streams. Why not? Two reasons. First of all, what they don't admit is that adding encryption technology to the broadband routers used would be difficult and expensive. Skype's software product makes them much more flexible. Second, the phone-centric companies rely on the traditional telephone company networks to link to non-broadband phones. Federal law already demands the phone companies allow law enforcement access to tap into the telephone calls of citizens (at least they're supposed to get a court order before eavesdropping, but sometimes little details get overlooked). So the phone-centric broadband phone companies can't guarantee encryption from end to end.

Skype software on both ends of the connection can guarantee control over the entire length of the call. Using the SkypeOut service to call to non-Skype phones kills that idea, however, leaving those conversations unencrypted over the traditional telephone lines.

3.3.3. Free Branch Office Connections

Have a small business? Want one? Have a partner? Need to talk to your partner in another city? Broadband phones will save you a fortune.

One enterprise telephone study I saw in mid-2004 said 90% of long distance charges for some huge companies are employees talking to employees. Isn't that what a water cooler is for, or is that too old-fashioned?

Your broadband phone works great as a local phone number, and with all the business plans and most of the residential plans, long distance calls within the U.S. and Canada are free. Have a partner in Chicago and you're in Cleveland? Call each other for free.

Companies buying a new business phone system based on Internet Telephony will receive a huge surprise: a magic extension capability. With an intelligent Internet Telephony phone, the link between the phone controllerwhich used to be a PBX (Private Branch eXchange) but now it's a computercan include the Internet. You know how you pick up a desk phone at work, dial an extension, and talk to your buddy a few cubicles down? With an Internet Telephony business phone system, that cubicle could be in Cleveland while you sit in Chattanooga.

Domestic long distance bills will become history when you get a broadband phone system. International calls are a different story, but standard long distance, between one place in the U.S. or Canada and another place within the U.S. and Canada, will become a not-so-fond memory for you. Switch to a broadband phone and talk cheap.