T-Mobile Launches HotSpot @Home and $10 Unlimited VOIP Service

[mandy]

The as yet unannounced HotSpot @Home website.  The service is expected to debut June 27, 2007

http://www.theonlyphoneyouneed.com/

[mandy]

A review of T-Mobile's new phone service:

T-Mobile did make an announcement last week. And even harder to believe, its new product may be as game-changing as Apple’s.

It’s called T-Mobile HotSpot @Home, and it’s absolutely ingenious. It could save you hundreds or thousands of dollars a year, and yet enrich T-Mobile at the same time. In the cellphone world, win-win plays like that are extremely rare.

Here’s the basic idea. If you’re willing to pay $10 a month on top of a regular T-Mobile voice plan, you get a special cellphone. When you’re out and about, it works like any other phone; calls eat up your monthly minutes as usual.

But when it’s in a Wi-Fi wireless Internet hot spot, this phone offers a huge bargain: all your calls are free...

full article: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/05/technology/circuits/05pogue.html?em&ex=1183780800&en=9b1df670af399cec&ei=5087%0A

[mandy]

A related article:

T-Mobile may be extending its Hotspot@Home service to offer voice over IP for fixed-line users.

The company is working with Linksys to make a router that integrates home phone lines into the service along with providing VoIP service over cell phones...

According to the FCC documents, the new router, which hasn't been officially introduced, has two ports in the back that can be used to attach regular phones to the router. This would allow Hotspot@Home users to add regular home phones to the service...

full article: http://news.com.com/8301-10784_3-9758420-7.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20

[mandy]

A related article: T-Mobile announces $10 per month VOIP service

T-Mobile confirmed Thursday it is testing an Internet-based calling plan meant to replace traditional land lines, a move that came just a day after it joined key rivals in announcing a flat-rate mobile plan that could help change the economics of the wireless industry. The new VoIP service, Talk Forever, lets mobile customers pay an additional $10 per month for unlimited at-home calling. It would require the users to purchase a router from T-Mobile, but the low price point could prove appealing...

T-Mobile's VoIP service innovation -- currently in the testing phase in Seattle and Dallas -- may constitute a recognition that many mobile users still are not satisfied with the coverage and quality of service they can get in their homes..

full article: http://ecommercetimes.com/story/T-Mobile...61783.html

[mandy]

Related:

While rivals such as AT&T, Verizon Wireless, and Sprint Nextel have been talking recently about building new 4G wireless networks, T-Mobile--which will begin offering 3G wireless service this summer--is leveraging cheap, unlicensed Wi-Fi technology to bring true broadband speed over wireless networks to some of its subscribers today.

There's no question Wi-Fi is far from perfect. Its use of unlicensed bandwidth can mean signal interference. And it's a short-range radio technology that will never be able to provide ubiquitous coverage. But when Wi-Fi is combined with a new 3G wireless network using phones that T-Mobile claims switch seamlessly between the two networks, it becomes an interesting story...

full article: http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9916988...=nefd.lede