Small Linux wireless routers may change VoIP economics

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[Thanks to Samuel K Lam for this pointer. Some excerpts --BSA]
             
 http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20040527.html

The Little Engine That Could
How Linux is Inadvertently Poised to Remake the Telephone and Internet
Markets
By Robert X. Cringely

One of the cheapest Linux computers you can buy brand new (not at a garage
sale) is the Linksys WRT54G, an 802.11g wireless access point and router
that includes a four-port 10/100 Ethernet switch and can be bought for as
little as $69.99 according to Froogle. 

Probably the most popular third-party firmware you can get for the WRT54G
comes from Sveasoft, a Swedish mobile phone software company. The WRT54G
with Sveasoft firmware is all you need to become your cul de sac's wireless
ISP. Going further, if a bunch of your friends in town had similarly
configured WRT54Gs, they could seamlessly work together and put out of
business your local telephone company.

The result is a box you connect to power, to a DSL or cable modem and MAYBE
to your PC (if all you want to be is a service provider the PC isn't needed)
and it automatically attaches itself to an OSPF mesh network that is
self-configuring. 

There is an obvious business opportunity here, especially for VoIP providers
like Vonage, Packet8 and their growing number of competitors. The typical
neighborhood WISP doesn't really want to DO anything beyond keeping the
router plugged-in and the bills paid, so a VoIP vendor could offer a bundled
phone-Internet service for, say, $30 per month. The result is a system with
economics with which a traditional local phone company simply can't compete.

   

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