Hi Guys,  I just ran across this US site. Does any of you computor buffs know if this site could be of any use to us in the UK: FreeWorld Dialup (FWD). Maybe some of you are already familiar with this technology ???

There are about to be a few of these services becoming available in the UK in the near future.

They all seem to be as confusing as one another. I am signed up to be a reseller for one service which allows free calls between PCs that have downloaded the software, otherwise a prepaid account operates.

I have not started promoting it yet because I can not understand the terms and conditions, nor where my commission will come from if it is really so free.

I am very suspicious of software that has to be downloaded to give a free service - no one is that rich that they can give things away free.

Skype is the one that appears to be in the lead at the moment. It works OK with Broadband at both ends - and you can call a telephone as well for a small fee.

I suspect the reason they are giving it away free at the moment is to establish a dominance in the worldwide market. Once they have that dominance - bingo!

I speak as someone who bought a Betamax VCR when there was a choice between 3 types.

Don't blame you for being sceptical about Skype, but I've been using various free PC to PC VOIP calling systems for 4 or 5 years.

I started off with Net2Phone; a US company that offered free PC to PC, as well as free calls to UK landlines and one other nominated country. (I chose Australia.)

These companies use the free PC to PC part to beta test the systems, but usually make no secret of their intention to charge for calls to 'normal' phones. It's most unlikely they will ever charge for PC to PC or their freesoftware.

The only other VOIP company I seem to recall that doesn't even offer UK residents a chance to pay for PC to land line calls is Buddy-Phone. They never offered anything but free PC to PC calls using free s/ware and it worked fine. I believe they have now changed their name to Nikotel, but I haven't used them for a long time.

Skype is about as good as it gets at the moment. There's no 'catch' if you just want to talk PC to PC and pay nothing. The calls worldwide and to UK landlines are cheap too.

VOIP has been in use by business for quite a while. (My Abbey Bank has Cisco IP phones on their desks and walls with lovely huge LCD screens.) I use a simple handset that just looks like any ordinary phone, but speakers and microphone works ok if you keep the two apart enough! (Feedback.)

I've just realised that FWD is what was started as the Jeff Pulver project. He was a bit of a VOIP pioneer.

Do a Google search for VOIP or IP phone/s and you'll probably find lots of companies to choose from.

Things seem to have moved on slowly but considerably since my first VOIP connection from my old 66Mhz 486 PC.

FWD is OK for free calls (you can call US, UK, Dutch, and Japanese freephone numbers) but it doesn't give you the option of making other PSTN (Public Switched Telephone Network) calls.

Once you sign up with FWD, you can get a free US number, by signing up with ipkall. You'll have a number in Washington State +1 360 227 xxxx

Services like these are only just taking off in the UK. Gossiptel lets you receive numbers on an 0870 number (yuck) but will shortly be offering geographic numbers as well. That means if you live outside the UK you can receive calls on it for free (with 0870), or for a small monthly fee (geographic).

Im looking to be a reseller for a company like this, and provide an analogue telephone adapter, which means you don't need to have your computer on to make calls. The list of alternative numbers to 0870 ones is ideal, as I can program adapters to translate any 0870 or 0845 number back into the geographic one!

Another VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol) service that looks interesting is www.babble.net .

This is a UK based service and the major benefit is that calls to conventional fixed line phones in the UK, US, continental Europe, Australia and New Zealand are free.

I've tried calls to the UK and Switzerland and they worked well. I used my computer's speakers and a microphone but it would probably be better with a proper USB phone handset plugged into the computer's USB port.

Any other experiences of this service?

Gossiptel looks interesting as it's hardware-based, and plugs into an ethernet port. One of my reasons for recommending Skype is that they produce versions for other platforms (Linux in particular). I won't support a system that required using Windows (as BT's solution does, no doubt - correct me if I'm wrong). So software-independent VoIP is promising.

A few months ago, Ofcom announced that 054 would be the code for VoIP phones. How much would this cost? The only 05 numbers BT list prices for at the moment are 055, and those are 5p/min. I don't see why there needs to be a special number for VoIP. It's just a way for the phone companies to make money out of VoIP customers who aren't paying for calls.

As an aside, isn't it interesting that Gossiptel are able to offer geographical numbers for any part of the country? So much for those companies who claim they use 0870 because it allows them to base their operation in different parts of the country.

a question for AJR Does babble.net work with windows 98?

Re your question on whether Babble works on Windows 98:

Babble say they only support Windows 2000 and XP at the moment. So it looks as though it won't work on Windows 98.

They say they are working on Mac OS X, though I assume this means it won't work on earlier Mac versions. And at the moment they don't seem to have a Linux release, though you can register interest in the Linux version if you want to.

However, I'm using it on Windows XP and it seems to work pretty well.

Sipgate offer free calls VOIP to VOIP and charge 1.7 pence per minute to PSTN(normal phones). The big plus with Sipgate is you can get a UK regional number ie 0191, you can call it  from 18866 for 1 pence connection charge. I have written an introductory guide to VOIP at http://www.dial0870.co.uk