TALKATIVE

Technology that supports the easy exchange of audio data across the Internet offers many benefits. Voice quality over Internet connections is often better than the quality of landline connections, despite rumors to the contrary. Additionally, Voice over IP (or VoIP for short) makes transatlantic telephone calls, which formerly cost a small fortune, free. Reason enough to take a closer look at the technology involved. Register First If you decide to start using the Internet as your telephone service, you will soon discover that you can’t simply pick up a phone and talk. Instead, you first need to register with a VoIP service provider, who will give you the necessary login credentials to let you use your Internet connection to log on to the provider’s SIP server. SIP is the name of the protocol that supports VoIP telephony. After completing this step, you also need a VoIP phone (a softphone – that is, telephone software – will do as an alternative) before you can start.