December 31, 2006
How Do You Define VoIP?
VoIP Central asks what is VoIP: information service or telecom service? This is in relation to a suit filed by the City of Baltimore, Maryland, against Vonage America regarding the latter's avoidance of a telephony excise tax. Baltimore obviously defines VoIP is a telecom service, which I'm inclined to do as well. Vonage say no, thus feeling justified in avoiding a US$3.50/month city tax for each telephony line. The tax was introduced by Mayor O'Malley to pay down the budget deficit.
If you ask me, I think it's kind of high, given how little VoIP monthly subscriptions often are. Even the FCC backed off on their proposed VoIP tax. But this kind of issue will likely be raised over and over again over the next several years, for as long as PSTN systems are around (likely quite some time).
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