How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free? • Hacker News Board

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#21

Post by seanalltogether » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:24 PM UTC

jballanc wrote: post #16

Bear with me here, but it seems to me like this is a good argument for socialism. Consider: why do termination fees exist? Clearly, as America was being wired with telephone service, the cost to run lines to rural areas was prohibitively expensive. So what's the capitalist/Randian thing to do? Well, charge more for phone service out there. If people can't afford it, then they'll move to where it is cheaper to have a…

I think there has always been a good argument for infrastructural socialism. Infrastructure requires the tricky navigation of public and private property rights. America in it's infinite wisdom decided to go with protected monopolies for providing public utilities (aside from water and roads) and we're constantly exposing the problems inherent in that system.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#22

Post by run4yourlives » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:27 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

You could say that about every blog post on the internet.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#23

Post by burgerbrain » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:28 PM UTC

VMG wrote: post #18

jballanc wrote: post #16

Bear with me here, but it seems to me like this is a good argument for socialism. Consider: why do termination fees exist? Clearly, as America was being wired with telephone service, the cost to run lines to rural areas was prohibitively expensive. So what's the capitalist/Randian thing to do? Well, charge more for phone service out there. If people can't afford it, then they'll move to where it is cheaper to have a…

So a government acts socialist, distorts the market, causes damage, and you think this is an argument for more socialism? All starting from the unwarranted assumption that telephone access was necessary to farmers and food prices would have risen dramatically.

"All starting from the unwarranted assumption that telephone access was necessary to farmers and food prices would have risen dramatically."

Yeah, that initial assumption really is weird.

How much could a phone line like that possibly cost for a company who does phone lines? I have no idea, maybe 10 million for all I know.

But that's a one-time cost that will be spread out over all the crops that farm produces for the next however many years that telephone line lasts. With some (admittedly ~10 years out of date) idea of some of the other costs involved in farming, I have a hard time seeing the bump to food prices being anything to get your undies in a twist about.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#24

Post by MichaelApproved » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:31 PM UTC

Even though the high cost to setup the lines have been collected, it's still expensive to maintain these lines so some version of this needs to be in place.

My solution would be to figure out what it costs annually to maintain this and limit the fees imposed on other companies to this fee. At the end of the year you calculate the percentage of calls your company terminated to the area and pay that percentage of the fixed fee.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#25

Post by andylei » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:43 PM UTC

jballanc wrote: post #16

Bear with me here, but it seems to me like this is a good argument for socialism. Consider: why do termination fees exist? Clearly, as America was being wired with telephone service, the cost to run lines to rural areas was prohibitively expensive. So what's the capitalist/Randian thing to do? Well, charge more for phone service out there. If people can't afford it, then they'll move to where it is cheaper to have a…

> there's obviously a really big incentive to the government and everyone that's not living in rural areas to not have the cost of food increase

> would've just had the government pay to install rural phone lines

you didn't decrease the price of food. you may have decreased the cost paid out of pocket by the consumer, but you haven't changed the actual cost of producing food. if the cost of those phone lines was $100MM, then either a) the government installs those phone lines for $100MM, or b) the farmers bear the cost of those phone lines and raise prices to make up $100MM. either way, someone has to pay that $100MM. you can pay for it either with your taxes or by paying more for food.

this socialist scheme never really changed anything, except it distorted the visible prices so that they do not match real costs. now all you've done is made it harder for the market to optimally allocate limited resources.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#26

Post by andylei » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:45 PM UTC

funkah wrote: post #17

jballanc wrote: post #16

Bear with me here, but it seems to me like this is a good argument for socialism. Consider: why do termination fees exist? Clearly, as America was being wired with telephone service, the cost to run lines to rural areas was prohibitively expensive. So what's the capitalist/Randian thing to do? Well, charge more for phone service out there. If people can't afford it, then they'll move to where it is cheaper to have a…

And a libertarian would count this as yet another instance where government intervention causes problems. To a worm in horseradish, the world is horseradish.

i'm no libertarian, and i don't believe that every government intervention causes problems, but i don't understand why you think this is a case where government intervention did not cause problems.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#27

Post by noonespecial » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:49 PM UTC

jballanc wrote: post #16

Bear with me here, but it seems to me like this is a good argument for socialism. Consider: why do termination fees exist? Clearly, as America was being wired with telephone service, the cost to run lines to rural areas was prohibitively expensive. So what's the capitalist/Randian thing to do? Well, charge more for phone service out there. If people can't afford it, then they'll move to where it is cheaper to have a…

Unfortunately, the cost of the government putting in those lines plus the cost of the inefficiency and corruption attached to government action still need to be paid. Which means the people have less money to buy the cheaper food.

Not only is government money not free, it happens to be some of the most expensive and inefficient money available.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#28

Post by chernevik » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:50 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?

Might handle the problem by putting the termination fees on a sliding scale based on call volume. Telco lines are fixed assets, if one line is getting millions of calls then the cost of that line should be amortized faster than assumed in the region-wide termination fee.

There will be complaints that revision will kill jobs in rural areas. Thus does the regulatory state accumulate, and willfully retain, misallocations and distortions.

This sort of rent-seeking and regulatory arbitrage is an inevitable outcome of regulation. Notice that while the stated goal is support for the little people, it's insiders and sharpies and incumbents who benefit most. Remote phone service seems a worthwhile goal, and I'm not sure I see a clearly better way of doing it, but let's just keep our eyes open to the costs.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#29

Post by chernevik » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:52 PM UTC

FfejL wrote: post #11

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?

It's outdated in the sense that the original reason for the high fees was to make it economically viable to provide service to people in rural areas. But the original sunk costs of wiring every home and business have long been paid off, and the digital-ization of the phone network has drastically reduced the ongoing costs of providing service to those folks. So it's outdated. On the other hand, there are plenty of lo…

The sunk costs to those particular lines receiving this traffic have been recovered. Others, not so sure. See my comment above.

Remember too that there are maintenance and replenishment costs. Over the long run, all costs are marginal.

Re: How Can A Free Conference Call Be Free?

#30

Post by ShabbyDoo » Mon, Jan 23, 2012, 5:52 PM UTC

8ig8 wrote: post #12

That explains why I can never connect using Vonage. Thanks. I always wondered about this, but not enough to dig into the details. Interesting.

It bothers me that the VOIP providers don't, say, play a special message explaining the issue. If it's not illegal for them to block these numbers, then why not at least explain themselves? Perhaps they could offer at-cost connections? "Press 1 if you are willing to pay $0.08/minute for this call"