Here's an article hat caught my eye from Wired today -

On the Road With VOIP
By Randy Dotinga
02:00 AM Oct, 05, 2006
After years as every geek's best friend, VOIP is beginning to untether itself from the PC, inspiring a new generation of products geared to break through to the mainstream.

One new company is boasting that customers can make VOIP calls over landlines or mobile phones without needing broadband. For $1 a week, another company connects international callers on mobile phones at no charge other than that for a local call.

"Voice over IP is moving from the early-adopter to the mass-market stage," said Lynda Starr, a senior communications analyst with Frost & Sullivan. "We're moving to these services that make it easier for non-geeks."

It caught my eye from a couple of different reasons.

Untethered is a word that's been an integral part of my vocabulary for the past few years. It began with the idea of the untethered Internet using wireless technologies. Today it's beyond the Internet as fixed mobile convergence solutions embrace what have traditionally been wireless data technologies to deploy VoIP solutions.

I agree with Starr that VoIP is beyond the early adopter stage. Without truly achieving the penetration that would normally accompany a sustaining technology, VOIP hit the mainstream as a convergence or unification of services technology that's really opening people's eyes to thinking about how, where and when we work.

Skype's flawed attempts at mobility have been widely discussed. There's a window of opportunity for others, hopefully SIP-based others, to fill the mobile VoIP gap. And we see a number of players scrambling to fill that need. Skype is losing ground, and mobile handset manufacturers, like Nokia, leverage every opportunity to embrace VoIP.

In short, mobile handset makers, and even the mobile carriers, are embracing the value of what could be perceived as a competitive technology. Legacy PSTN carriers resisted cellular technology, and they've been resistant to VoIP. Wireless carriers, on the other hand, are beginning to embrace the disruption of VoIP and are looking to incorporate it into their suite of mobility solutions in creative ways.

Another reason the article caught my attention is that I'm on a panel entitled The Next Wave: The Future of IP Communications Technology at the ITExpo with Ronald Gruia, also from Frost & Sullivan. He, Jon Arnold and I will be poking around in our crystal balls exploring what the next wave of innovation and creativity in IP communications will be. I'll be interested to hear his thoughts.


Technorati Tags: VoIP, fixed mobile convergence, mobility, wireless