GNU Free Call: A Proposed Free Phone To Skype

[phoronix]

Phoronix: GNU Free Call: A Proposed Free Phone To Skype

The GNU Free Call project was released today. It's a project that's self described to be a new communication service to compete with Skype that is designed to be free as in freedom and free as in no cost...

http://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=OTIxMg

[r1348]

Decentralized, crypted SIP communicaton? I'm already drooling.

[conorsulli]

No doubt they will have a better name when the actual produact is released I hope...

"GNU free call" vs "skype" ya know what I mean?

or will it be known as just "freecall" which aint that bad I suppose

[nico342]

That sound a great idea !

[snuwoods]

okay, this is practically on par with a steam release.
decentralized and opensource!!!

[Nille]

Smells like potential port forwarding hell. I hope they make it so easy like Skype.

[Ellipsis]

As stated Open Source projects really need to come up with some better names. GNU Free Call... is mehhhh just call it Free Call.

[TechMage89]

I have a challenge for it:
Work through an http proxy that only allows encrypted tcp traffic destined for port 443.

You can't really do that without relays.
Who will provide that infrastructure? The only possibility I can think of is to have connected users serve as relays like Skype nodes.

The problem there is that you need a way to intelligently route traffic in a low-latency manner through nodes that may have questionable reliability, and the stream transmission guarantee of tcp is a major stumbling-block to that.

[BlackStar]

The project has already failed, they just don't know it yet. Why, you say? Just read the "how" section in the article.

In short, will this thing list all my friends so I can just click on "call" to talk to them? Without manual setup and user guides? Will I be able to call landlines?

[Pickup]

To Skype or not to Skype?

Will be possible to contact a Skype user via GNU free call? AND (not OR) vice versa? if I do skype calls via facebook can I reach or be reached by a GFC user?

If the answer is no... Ekiga . Game over, Gnu Free Call .

P.S. What about IP to non-IP calls?