"larry" wrote in message

John Gilmer wrote:
I guess I don't know much about the "business model"
used by the VOIP companies.

For example, Google provides its services for free in
the hope that we will glance it the paid ads. It hopes
that the Gmail users will use web mail a lot and thus
view the ads rather than accessing it via a mail server
(which I do.)
If a company offers very low cost VOIP calls it still
has the cost of connecting to the conventional "wired"
telephone network. Is this cost trivial?

Most of the low cost voip services use "DID", where they
buy(rent) blocks of numbers in groups of 10, 100, or 1000
in different area codes. These cost about 50 cents a
month for each number. They use a "soft switch" or
"virtual (phone)office" that provides internet
connections to your computer "softphone".

If you call a number from their line to another number
that is also their line, they handle the call
"end-to-end" for very very low cost. If the call is to a
line at another company, they share the cost, if it's to
a traditional (ilec) company they pay thru the nose to
complete the call.
Caller id is delivered like cellphone calls, number only,
few are willing to pay the "per dip" charge to get the
matching name from the database, run by the ilecs.

They use the "number portability" system to allow you to
use your previous number with your new number. It's all
a big call forwarding scheme.

-- larry/dallas

I am not sure what all that means but my caller ID with Vonage VOIP shows
number and name every time unless it is a cell phone call when it displays
"MA Wireless" for calls from Massachusetts to where I live in New Hampshire.
Some phones I have show different ID configuration indicating it has more to
do with the individual phone itself rather than any particular service.