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the new york times references arthur c. clarke's 2061: odyssey three in an article about the growing number of flat-rate local and long distance phone service plans. if that sounds familiar, it’s because i made the same reference on april 16, 2002 when i first heard about mci’s flat-rate plan. (of course, clarke was talking about flat-rate international calling, and that is probably still at least a decade or so off in the future.)

even local not-so-baby bell sbc has gotten in to the game.

(there’s also a point about the case against micropayments to be made here, but i’ll leave that as an exercise for the reader.)

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just those NYTimes hacks at it again.

» fritzkafka » may 23, 2003 1:30pm

A decade? I think flat rate international calling will be common in a decade. Not universal, but many of us will use VoIP by then.

- ask (running his answering machine on Linux)

» Ask Bjoern Hansen (link) » may 24, 2003 4:13am

ah yes, voip. i hadn't even considered that. but i'm not sure how much it would change my estimate—adoption of technology within the telecom space is painfully slow. is anybody even offering global flat-rate service over voip right now?

but it could turn out that voip is such a great deal in the business space that it drives the technology fast enough for residential adoption to be quick. but quick enough for residential flat-rate voip-based international calling to be where residential flat-rate non-voip domestic calling is today?

i used a linux box as my answering machine for a while, but now that i don't have a 24×7 linux box at home, i just go without any sort of answering machine.

» jim (link) » may 24, 2003 7:09am

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