Pipes Network Clog Death is more universal than life; everyone dies but not everyone lives.

Skype

In case you don't know what it is, go to www.skype.com and check it out.

I've been using it a little bit for around a year now. It started off as a way for my professor to hold office hours with the distance learning students for the class I took last fall. Now, I have completely replaced my home phone with it, and I can use it to see my 6-month old nephew who is over 1,000 miles away.

Not only can you make free calls to anywhere in the U.S., but for $38 a year (with free voice mail), you can receive calls from anywhere as well. Thats a heck of a lot cheaper than the $25 a month for a phone I never used. The only downfall is right now you have to either use a computer microphone, or buy a USB phone which plugs into your computer. You can however by cordless USB phones, so that is the ideal solution, but then run around $80. Even figuring that into the cost though, $118 instead of $300 for a years worth of service seems pretty darn good to me.

Also, in the near future they are coming out with Wi-Fi skype phones that will not need to be plugged into a computer to work. These however are expected to cost between $250-$300, so that is way more than I would spend on a phone.

So far, I'm content with my $20 wal-mart special that looks like an old cell phone.