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Skype.com definitely has one of the better Skype to Skype phone calls out there. Also, since it’s free from one Skype user to the next, it’s also a great service.

However, I think they are VERY misleading when it comes to fees. When looking over their fees for calls, the price to call the United States looked very good…about .017 per minute. The odd thing is that I don’t even use a minute before charged more than this. I ripped through $10 in about 2-3 weeks of occasional calls whereas with Voipwise, it took me 3+ months before I used the $10. A huge difference! It will be good for eBay since they own Skype, but not for it’s users. It’s not much of a deal unless you use their Skype to Skype service, in my humble opinion.

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Well, the service does tell you how long you have on the original 10 Euros and counts down like 3 months or so & then counts down. Once you do use up the time of free calls minus some areas that do require a few cents/Euro cents — not sure what you call those…well, it turns into .01 cent per minute. So, we’ve been using our remaining Euro credit … the amazing thing is that we’ve been calling for more than 3 months and making tons and tons of calls, but haven’t used up that original 10 Euros yet! Amazing…

It’s quite the deal for phone services and like Jumi said, the quality of the calls are EXCELLENT!

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From the NYT:

By John Markoff

Can an untested Silicon Valley start-up with the slightly embarrassing name Ribbit take on corporate giants like Microsoft and Avaya?

On Monday, Ribbit, based in Mountain View, Calif., will announce a telephone Web service intended to make it possible for programmers to add telephone features to any Web page. This isn’t just a widget for talking to your friends, like Skype and its many “Voice 2.0” imitators.

Rather, Ribbit is offering a full telephone switchboard on its server, connected both to the Internet and to the public-switched telephone network. That makes it possible for developers ranging from companies offering customer-relationship management services, to online shopping Web sites to add a phone feature by just embedding Adobe Flash into a Web site. (Om Malik has written a quick look at some of the technical features of Ribbit.) (Read the article)

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OK, I have been trying few different Voip services for a while without any luck on true “free” calls, today might be my luck day!

Today, I found this site http://voipwise.com. This one, just like any other VOIP services, you download their app and call to the listed countries for “free”. Most other services require you to buy “credit” up front before you can start making calls (and usually expires in 3 months or so). Well, well, well, I am happy to announce that I have just made LONG international calls (exactly 2 calls to Japan for about an one hour each) for totally FREE!!! I did NOT have to pay any credit up front either! The interface of the app is very simple to use. No confusion whatsoever. I simply dialed, and BOOM! I am connected to my friend’s landline in Japan. The quality of calls are EXCELLENT. Actually, this may have been the best one yet. It is SOOO clear that I even forgot I was talking using the Voip. As many other “good services” won’t be lasting forever, I am not sure how long this will be around. But certainly worth a try. Hey, what the heck, you really have nothing to lose for “free”, right?!

UPDATE:
After making more than 3-4 hours of free calls to overseas, I finally reached the “Totally Free” calling time limit… Now the system won’t connect me unless I buy a credit (10 euro). I have been extremely happy with the service, so I thought “what the heck…! Let’s give it a try.” I had a little difficulty paying (go figure… they didn’t want to take my money?!?) so I sent a “HELP!” email to their support. They actually replied in timely manner, and after going back and forth for a couple of times, I was finally able to get through the process to pay and got the credit:) (for those of you accessing from the US, when you get an error message regarding your phone number, you have to enter your phone number as the following format: 001-xxx-xxx-xxxx. Instead of just typing “1″, put “001″ in front of your area code. For other countries, I assume the same and put 00 in front of your country code. For example, the UK country code is +44, so input 0044.
As soon as I paid (I used PayPal service), immediately the credit appeared on my account and I was able to continue making callsJ This credit is good for 120 days and you can make something like 300 minutes a week (which is plenty for a normal use, right?). For 4 months of calling, I think this is a great deal. I can call any landline listed “FREE” without getting charged. If I do call numbers not listed free (like say calling Japan cell phone line), then they will deduct whatever I used from the credit I have. If I call a ton of non-free call and use up all my credit before 120 days, then you have to buy credits again.

Anyway, so far I am a happy VoipWise userJ For 10 euro, I can call all my friends all over the world for 4 months, I think this is a pretty good deal and well worth it. It is ALMOST freeJ

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On the way back home from a recent trip, I stopped by this podunk city by the name of Cheoram to get to Busan on the train ride back down south. However, this time it was daylight and I could see how run down the city was and how desolate it really was more clearly. I looked for a restaurant because I was starving starving, but since it was Chuseok, nothing was open. So, I settled for the convenience store, if you can call it that, across from the station. The building was just as run down as the buildings next to it & it smelled pretty bad when walking in. I grabbed some ramyun and dared to ask for some boiled water from the owner who I had to yell for a few times to get him to come back in and tend to me and another set of customers.

I wasn’t sure about what sort of water he would boil for me, but fortunately, I didn’t get indigestion until much later. It would of killed me if it would of affected me soon after eating it. The 5 hour train ride was only painful on the last 1 hour leg. Anyway, getting back to the shack of a convenience store. Since the guy was so friendly despite his place being dangerous to most peoples’ health, I ended up eating the ramyun in his store while waiting for my train. Half way through the bowl, I hear this sound like an old 2400 baud modem used to dial up Prodigy and wondered where the noise was coming from.

I turn back and see the owner sitting on his bed (which happened to be behind the cash register) with headphones on his head dialing up a friend or relative via some Skype like VOIP service. I did a double take and realized “oh my gosh, this guy is savvier than most modern day folks who think themselves as savvy. Frankly, I know I’m relatively “up with it” with the most recent websites and regularly inform my friends and coworkers about the latest websites that add to their lives. However, I failed to really accept VOIP until about a month ago when we had to call more candidates abroad and I found you can do it for free on several services. The services even let you have the companies that sponsor them call you via a land line letting you talk as if you just called someone over your regular phone.

However, this guy in this shack of a store in this podunk town is more “in touch” with technology than me.

Two thoughts: 1) it just goes to show never underestimate anyone including people in far off remote areas or 2) Korea is simply the most connected and relatively savviest folks on the earth in terms (of at least telecommunications) technology.

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One thing I am reminded constantly when calling back home to the United States is the lack of people available on the other end.  It’s not because they don’t have their cellular phones with them, but rather the fact they usually let phone calls go to voicemail.  Even worse, if you’re calling with one of these free services, you better give your party that you’re calling a warning since they usually assume it’s spam or some solicitor calling them.  Nevertheless, they usually end up let it go to voicemail with the possibility to call back.   (Read the article)

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In search of a new “free” VoIP service, I stumbled into this site called www.jaxtr.com.  This is a bit different from any other VoIP service I know of.  Although it’s a limited “free” call service (100 minutes a month), you can get connected to a land line AND cell phone in anywhere AS LONG AS the number is registered to this site.  Once you register your number, anyone can call you at your specified number through their specified line (their landline or cell phone).  And also you can have your own jaxtr.com link for your friend to call you.  This site offers linking to many popular online community sites (like MySpace and Facebook) and (Read the article)

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Well, I just had to start finding ways to reduce our costs in our Recruiting Department.  One larger expense is calling people internationally since we recruit a lot of our candidates abroad.  We were needing to speak to a candidate in Amsterdam a couple weeks ago & one of our past employees who called her boyfriend almost daily in the states from here in South Korea recommended VoipCheap.com (Read the article)

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