Free phone calls come to the iPhone
It’s the application Steve Jobs says he has no intention of putting on the iPhone.
And it’s here anyway.
On Wednesday, an Israeli company called Fring began offering free downloads of a program that lets you make toll-free phone calls on an iPhone, bypassing AT&T and every other cellular carrier. In other words, it does for the iPhone what Skype does for computers.
Technically, the service Fring offers is peer-to-peer Mobile VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol), and like Skype it requires that both parties first install the Fring client on their mobile phones. Both devices must also be Jailbroken before Fring can be installed, a multi-step process that voids your Apple (AAPL) warranty (and hasn’t worked for me for several firmware upgrades).
Fring was co-founded by Avi Shechter, one of the guys who ran ICQ, the first Internet-wide peer-to-peer instant messaging service. Fring also supports MSN Messenger, Google Talk, ICQ, SIP, Twitter, Yahoo and AIM.
Once your phone is Jailbroken (see, for example, here), you can download Fring at the “fringcubator” here. Below the fold: a video showing the software in action.
The question is -
When Skype client comes out on the iPhone via the SDK (i.e. a “legal” program), will there be any reason why Apple will not distribute it?
The Fortune guys just want to drive the stock down so they can buy some shares cheap. :-)
Apple will end up making a lot more on hardware sales than on AT&T kickbacks. iPhone is going viral all over the world. No kidding, people might not be technical, they might not read the manuals, but for iPod/iPhone, it’s obvious that they are a class above (at least) all competetors, and everyone wants the best.
It’s really as simple as the the old ‘build a better mousetrap and the world will beat a path to your door’ idea.
Macs have always been great computers, but that is a bit harder to grok.
The last I read from Steve Jobs about this he expressed no objection to VOIP on the iPhone as long as it is over WIFI on not over cell.
Technically there is nothing new here. This is very similar to Skype.
I would expect that once the iPhone 2.0 will be released there will be several apps for VOIP that will not require jailbreak. The only question is how these apps will overcome the no app running in the background limitation for incoming VOIP calls.
It won’t be long before Skype come up with their version for iPhone.
Steve Jobs officially says it’s the application he won’t put on the iPhone.. and rightly so since ATT is a partner
however i am sure he doesn’t give a damn and he knows very well that’s what people want
shouldnt the title be “free phone calls come to the Hacked or Jailbreak iPhone and not the Standard issue iPhone”
I’m starting to think that maybe none of the Geek media get it yet? Article after article about jailbroken iPhone applications? Jobs is going after the mainstream consumer who will pay for a service. What is Fortune magazine? Is it a Geek Magazine or is it for the average consumer? Seems to me maybe you should be writing for Endgadget or Wired?
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Silicon Valley veterans like to joke that Steve Jobs must be surrounded by a reality distortion field; if you get too close to him, you start to believe what he's saying. Thanks to the success of the iPod, the launch of the iPhone and the renewed interest in the Mac, Apple has made believers out of millions of customers - and made a lot of investors rich. But Philip Elmer-DeWitt believes that an ounce of skepticism never hurts when writing about the company. He should know. He's been covering Apple - and watching Steve Jobs operate - since 1982, first for Time Magazine, then for Business 2.0, and now for Fortune.
This is about a (+/- 50) (one hundred) 100 Billion dollar business if you include all the telcos (telephone companies) in the US alone. What’s siginificant here is the support for VoIP over cellular data connections, or non-WiFi connections.
The big question is whether Fring can say that the telcos can’t technically prevent VoIP over cellular data connections (3G, Edge, etc.). Can Fring make the data stream, so that it will be indistinguishable from browsing the web and making VoIP calls.
If Fring can confidently say yes and if they’re right, then the telcos can change their data/voice plan by increasing the data plan cost just enough so they can stay comfortably profitable and continue to be in business.
Being able to do whatever you want with the data throught the cellular connections will promote creativity and will eventually help the overall scientific and technology industry, including the telcos themselves.