Comments on: Congress mulls new Net phone rules

Bill would bar states from regulating VoIP, turning it over to FCC instead. But this could still mean higher costs for Net phone calls.

VoIP cannot be regulated

Silly government is at it again.

They are going to try and regulate an industry which would best be left unregulated.

The power of the internet is that once you have the basic connection, most anything is possible - and it does not require regulatory infrastructure to support.

with the advent of IPv6 and WiMAX along with traditional DNS services, we are not going to need a regulatory body to control VoIP companies.

Why? Because these companies will not be providing anything that doesn't already exist. Sure, some companies will exist to create a 'packaged service' model, but in general, you dont need them.

All you need is:
1. a high speed internet connection (currently cable modem, but in the future it will be free wireless networks)
2. a device capable of telephony - meaning a device with a microphone, speaker, and wireless technology built into it running on open-source software (all for around $15-30 when mass produced).

That's it. People can call you on your IP address (or domain name if you have one), and they connect directly to you...no need for middle men.

What the government fails to understand about the internet is that the developers will circumvent unnecessary restrictions placed on them. Try regulating VoIP and you will soon have 100 free unregulated versions (look what happened when the RIAA squashed napster).

Instead of all this regulation nonsense, the government should just set aside a small portion of federal income taxes to help develop a free ubiquitous wireless internet infrastructure for the common good of all.

[John Kuzak]

Try regulating VoIP

http://www.analogstereo.com/saturn_s_series_owners_manual.htm

[tlshillam]

VoIP Peer-to-Peer

First, I do not care if Washington wants to start legislating VoIP networks that connect to traditional land-line phone networks--that I do not mind. However, I would stongly oppose any idea of regulating pure VoIP networks, specifically peer-to-peer networks, such as Skype (www.skype.com). The reason I say this is because I am already paying for Internet access through my ISP (Internet Service Provider). If the government were to start regulating this network topology and the type of data that trasverses a pure VoIP network, what's next? So I'll have the government telling me what data I can and cannot send or receive on any peer-to-peer network? We already have the major recording labels outlawing the sharing of copyrighted music on peer-to-peer networks. Where's the limit here? Next thing we know, we will not be able to send or share other data types on peer-to-peer networks.

In closing, could any of us create a peer-to-peer network that the government would stay out of?