Regulating net phones

Today's New York Times was full of good stuff, and I got to go through most of it in the time it took to consume the World's Largest Breakfast that was served up, somewhat unexpectedly, in the diner downstairs. The story that caught my eye most was one by Matt Richtel, who has been looking at the debate surrounding the regulation of internet telephony. Basically, all the big telcos in the US are jumping on internet telephony as a way of escaping hefty taxes and surcharges applied to conventional telephone tariffs. Thus, they can offer dramatically lower phone bills to users. The downside is the money is used to take the US phone service to every far-flung corner of the nation, and to supply cheap telephony to the elderly and poor. The phone companies don't flinch from spelling out their desire to escape their existing obligations. Richard Notebaert, CEO of Qwest, says of regulation and universal service: "I do not think it should be retained at all." It's a fine example of how an apparently innocuous internet technology could bring about quite tumultuous change for offline society. The internet revolution has barely begun...