VoIP: Bringing disorder to the market

A couple of stories on the web today about disgruntled telcos trying to block Skype. One at Skypejournal where they confirm Oman is blocking access to Skype's website. As commented before this is likely to be futile as Skype's program can be emailed, friends and family can top up Skype-out accounts for expats and users can always go to services such as anomymizer. Meanwhile while the rest of the world is trying o think up ways to sustain, at least some, public phone boxes, China Netcom is trying to shut down their growth. Apparently small entrepreneurs are using broadband connections and VoIP to offer the passing public inexpensive calls from kiosks. The less than US$0.02 per minute rate sounds like they are using Skype. China Netcom says the kiosks bring "disorder to the market". An alternative view would be that the VoIP kiosks bring competition and public service.