Designed to gather information regarding technology advancements and regulatory issues related to VoIP services, an open forum conducted by the FCC includes representatives from an array of I.T. firms with a vested interest in providing such services to businesses and consumers.

Voice, Data Converge

Until recently, the U.S. government has taken a hands-off approach to VoIP -- a technology that takes voice communications and transmits them as packets of data on broadband networks -- recognizing it as an Internet-based service. While that is the position held by many companies jumping into the VoIP market, phone operators and others see it as a communications system subject to the same rules as circuit-based technology.

Thus far, the FCC has looked at voice from data communications as a separate entity, but the lines have blurred to the point where the government now needs to apply some rules established for traditional voice service to Internet calling, said Yankee Group analyst Zeus Kerravala.

"Carriers are pushing regulation, because VoIP changes the game in terms of how voice services are delivered," he told NewsFactor. "There will be some regulations instituted, because if nothing is done, the phone companies stand to lose hundreds of millions of dollars."

What Is a Phone Company?

Among those pushing Internet-based calling are U.S. operators AT&T, Verizon and SBC Communications, as well as VoIP specialists -- Vonage, for example -- that are lobbying the FCC to maintain its distance.

"With major operators going the VoIP route, the FCC needs to implement rules of engagement sooner rather than later," said Kerravala, explaining that the big-name communications firms are not as nimble as the newcomers rolling out new services.

The VoIP issue has stirred debate in recent months as several states have attempted to regulate the technology as a traditional telephone service. Last month, though, a federal judge in Minnesota overturned the state's attempt to regulate VoIP service, ruling that congressional intent is to leave the Internet and information services largely unregulated.

IDC analyst Will Stofega suggested that the very definition of a phone company needs to be clarified. "If you advertise as a phone company, like Vonage and others do, you have to comply with the same regulations as those companies are required to meet," he told NewsFactor. "To say you are just a distributor of data packets is misleading." (continued...)

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