[geeks] Vonage alternative?

[Charles Shannon Hendrix]

Tue, 17 Apr 2007 @ 12:50 -0400, Phil Stracchino said:

> IMHO, it's not a geek-points hit.  Having a POTS phone isn't "being
> technologically backwards", it's "having a fully independent redundant
> system."  Putting all your eggs into one basket for the sake of being
> able to boast the latest techno-bling buzzwords is "faux geek".

Yeah, what happened to the days when the phone system was one of the
primary geek domains?

I love high speed networking... but in every major communication outtage
in the last 10 years, it was POTS and my modem that kept working.

I still have fond memories of the BBS scene, minicomputer dial ins, and
things like the US Army's autovon system and the BBS, net gateways, and
systems on it.

There was also a system called something like "The Florida Underground",
which was a private phone system cobbled together by people along the
east coast USA. If you could connect to it, you could go nearly anywhere
in the world. It's possible TFU was just a connection point to it, but
that's the only name I remember now.

Those were the days...

-- 
shannon           | We have nothing to prove.
                  |        -- Alan Dawkins