Pulver debuts P2P Bellster network

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or swapping digitized content such as music and videos, Bellster instead shares communications networks.

That raises a threatening notion for telephone companies already struggling with falling profits and tectonic shifts in networking technology: If they lose their role as traffic cops that direct voice and data traffic on their networks, they could find themselves with even more pressure on their bottom lines.

Oh man, is there assembly required?
Like most new technology, Bellster necessitates much assembly of expensive equipment, and the software has so far only managed to attract a few hundred users since its recent release.

"It sounds like a typical Pulver poke in the eye of the phone industry."

--phone industry analyst

The basic ingredients are a local landline or cell phone line, a personal computer loaded with phone software known as a soft phone, and a server storing software from an open-source PBX (private branch exchange) called Asterisk. A PBX is essential to direct phone traffic. Also required is a converter for connecting your phone line to the Internet.

Next, minutes of calling time are needed. Where do all these minutes come from? People donate them, largely from the package of unlimited calling they have. Initially, Bellster users can only make calls if they donate calls.

Once the pieces are in place, Bellster creates what Pulver calls a "telephone cooperative." The call begins on someone's computer using the soft phone. It's broken into bits of data that travel over the Internet to a Bellster member's computer in the vicinity of the call's destination. The call then jumps back onto the traditional phone network using the Bellster member's local or cell phone line, which completes the call.

		Related story Net phone fees have users fuming Trying to soothe state regulators by highlighting regulatory fees, VoIP providers are instead angering customers.

Pulver says there are already concerns about Bellster, including worries about a stranger using your phone line to make calls for potentially illegal purposes.

But there are also built-in safeguards; for instance, you can block certain numbers from being dialed from your line, and Bellster lets you set limits on how many calls you permit.

"The Bellster challenge for 2005 is to find out whether or not there are still people in the world who would let total strangers place noncommercial phone calls for free in exchange for the ability to do the same thing themselves," Pulver said in an e-mail.