VOIP international calls

Skype mobile voip service

The voip mobile service for 3G phones was launched by Skype and can be downloaded from its website directly to the phone in much the same way as a new ringtone or game would be. It will operate on more than 40 handsets from Motorola, Nokia, Samsung and Sony Ericsson and work in countries including the UK, Denmark, Finland, Poland, Sweden and Brazil.

Skype's new mobile application takes advantage of the fact that many of today's phones use high-speed 3G technology for video calling and web browsing. Connecting to Skype's service costs the same as a national-rate phone call but you can then talk to other Skype users at no extra cost, whether they are in San Francisco or Swindon.

Understandably, this has some mobile phone networks - which can charge 30p a minute for UK calls and many times more for international ones - worried. If users migrate en masse to Skype's service it will cost them millions in lost revenue. Already three of the UK's four biggest networks (O2 T-Mobile and Orange) have banned customers from using mobile Voip services on their phones. Vodafone, takes a more pragmatic view. It offers unlimited browsing to most new contract customers, and has decided not to block mobile Voip applications.

A Vodafone spokesman said: "Our internet offering is unlimited so you can use it for anything you want. However, most of our customers don't use mobile Voip because they get customer service and quality of service already with their traditional calling plan."

Voip widgets

Busta
The Busta widget is a speedy and very lightweight VoIP widget that can be embedded into your Google, Live, Pageflakes or Netvibes homepage with ease. There is also a handy Firefox extension that places Busta in your browser's sidebar for convenience. Busta is based on SIP technology, which means you can make cheap calls to landlines and mobiles on the PSTN and free calls to other devices on SIP networks.

GizmoCall
The GizmoCall widget is being developed by the same parent company responsible for Gizmo and Gizmo5, which is their mobile VoIP offering. Unlike Busta, the GizmoCall widget is far from lightweight but it is based on SIP, which means free calls to other Gizmo contacts and SIP devices as well as reduced rates to landlines and mobiles. You can easily embed a link in any blog or MySpace / Facebook or other social network profile so friends can call you. Registered GizmoCall users get 5 free minutes usage.

Jajah
The much lauded Jajah web-based VoIP service also has a very capable widget that can be dropped into your emails, blog and a variety of social network profiles including those of MySpace and Bebo. Jajah works as an intermediary; the Jajah widget lets users enter their own number and the number you want to call, Jajah calls and connects both numbers, which saves you money. Out of all the widgets, Jajah's is the most rounded and widely supported.

Jaxtr
While it may be less widely appreciated when compared to Jajah, the Jaxtr widget is a polished product. Not only can you embed the Jaxtr widget in your MySpace, Friendster, Blogger, LinkedIn profile to allow friends to call for cheap, but with Jaxtr you can also send SMS and receive voice messages. Calls to other Jaxtr users are free.

Wengovisio
The Wengovisio widget is developed by the same people who have brought us Wengophone in the past. The Flash widget can be installed on a blog or social network profile with embedded CSS and JavaScript. The best feature of the Wengovisio widget is that it is capable of both audio and visual calls, right from within the widget. Wengovisio doesn't let you call landines or mobile phones.

VoIP Solutions

Voice over Internet Protocol, also called VoIP, IP Telephony, Internet telephony, Broadband telephony, Broadband Phone and Voice over Broadband is the routing of voice conversations over the Internet or through any other IP-based network.

Companies providing VoIP service are commonly referred to as providers, and protocols which are used to carry voice signals over the IP network are commonly referred to as Voice over IP or VoIP protocols. They may be viewed as commercial realizations of the experimental Network Voice Protocol (1973) invented for the ARPANET providers. Some cost savings are due to utilizing a single network to carry voice and data, especially where users have existing underutilized network capacity that can carry VoIP at no additional cost.