How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#1

Post by startupstella » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 3:25 PM UTC

How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?
feefighters.com

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#2

Post by eli » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 3:52 PM UTC

This seems like a good example of SEO-driven linkbait.

It's not quite spam -- the story is interesting, if not exactly breaking news -- but I'm pretty sure the main goal is to get inbound links to feefighters.com

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#3

Post by azolotov » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 3:57 PM UTC

eli wrote: post #2

This seems like a good example of SEO-driven linkbait. It's not quite spam -- the story is interesting, if not exactly breaking news -- but I'm pretty sure the main goal is to get inbound links to feefighters.com

Who cares, as long as the story is interesting, and well written? I actually learned something that I wanted to know for a long time, but never bothered to look up.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#4

Post by gkoberger » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 3:57 PM UTC

eli wrote: post #2

This seems like a good example of SEO-driven linkbait. It's not quite spam -- the story is interesting, if not exactly breaking news -- but I'm pretty sure the main goal is to get inbound links to feefighters.com

It's an interesting blog post that happens to be on a company's blog -- how is that any different than the thousands of other blog posts on HN from company blogs?

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#5

Post by dangero » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 3:58 PM UTC

eli wrote: post #2

This seems like a good example of SEO-driven linkbait. It's not quite spam -- the story is interesting, if not exactly breaking news -- but I'm pretty sure the main goal is to get inbound links to feefighters.com

Inbound links are the indirect goal of every blogger. I found the article to be very informative about the details of a business segment I wasn't familiar with. What makes this article different than others?

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#6

Post by srehnborg » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 4:05 PM UTC

AT&T and Google Voice had a dispute over this a few years ago because AT&T must terminate all calls and GV was blocking calls to the freeconferencecall.com numbers.

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2009/10/att-accused-...

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#7

Post by danso » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 4:07 PM UTC

Pretty fascinating...the OP describes the regulation as "outdated"...but are there rural companies that depend on it? Or is it truly outdated and due for a change?

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#8

Post by jilebedev » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 4:15 PM UTC

danso wrote: post #7

Pretty fascinating...the OP describes the regulation as "outdated"...but are there rural companies that depend on it? Or is it truly outdated and due for a change?

I think it's fascinating in and of itself that large telecommunication companies are inconvenienced in any fashion for the purpose of market diversity and fair competition. I would enjoy reading more about such laws.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#9

Post by stanleydrew » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 4:18 PM UTC

This is all true. One technicality though is that Google Voice is not a VOIP solution (yet) which is why the fight with ATT over terminating rural calls is interesting.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#10

Post by biot » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 4:23 PM UTC

Here's a 2007 article explaining this:

http://pcworld.about.net/od/webtelephonyconferencing/FCC-ref...