Backdoor dialing is one method to establish free calls to  Internet phones using regular phones (landlines or mobile phones). It is a two-step process:

1. Dial the nearest access number (can be in New York, London, Sydney,etc)  -  the list of numbers is usually posted on the provider’s website
2. When the call is answered, dial the Internet phone number.

When the dialing is complete, the Internet phone rings regardless of it’s location (e.g. Philippines)  as long as it’s connected online to the Internet.  My Internet phone is a stand-alone unit. I just leave it on during my waking hours. The setup works just like an ordinary phone.

Re cost. It’s free call when the access number is just a local call. However, in Europe, their local call is metered so that’s the only cost to the caller. Even if the caller is in Middle East countries.  They can save by dialing the US access number vs.  dialing direct to the Philippines.

My foreign callers (relatives/friends) find this very convenient because they can call me anytime, anywhere e.g. at home, work or mobiling. Although voice/video chat is also free, it’s only done at home – after office hours.

As you can see, this setup is no brainer  – even kids and old folks can use it. This setup is ideal to connect old folks and family back home and save a lot of money, too!

ITU (International Telecommunication Union) created a country code +883 for the VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) in June 2008. When implemented, IP phones will be reachable from regular phones by dialing +833 prefix. IP phone users needs to get their iNum (International Numbers) to be reachable via +883. iNum is a country-less phone number so you can use it anywhere. As of it’s implementation with telcos, it remains to be seen. As of now, iNums are reachable only thru affiliate providers access numbers. Visit iNum for more details.

At last, Camiguin Telephone Cooperative (CAMTECO) put up an online directory of it’s subscribers. You can search for part of the subscriber name or address. It’s still under construction so you can find the webpage still looks crude, many disconnected phone numbers still appear, CAMTECO phone numbers are not posted, etc. but it’s still useful to establish initial contact.

For those who are searching for phone number of resorts, many are listed by the name of the owner (not on their business name).  So, search first for the name “tourism”, call them and ask for more details.

So here’s the website http://www.camiguinonline.com

For more information, please call CAMTECO office numbers: (88)387-1000 or (88)387-1002.

If you think in 1994 by CAMTECO, the Phil-German Telephone Project, you are dead wrong!!! It was on the 60’s. Ask your elders. Post your answer.

In the last General Assemby meeting, the elected officers were:

Board of Directors

• James Bollozos – Chairman
• Antonio Credo – Vice-chairman
• Evangelisto Almonia
• Jesus Flores
• Jesus Wong
• Gorgonio Manlangit
• Emmanuel Aranas

Audit & Inventory Committee

• Corazon Ballentos – Chairperson
• Mercy Marquez – Member
• Josefina Ebarle – Member

Most email users only know webmail – like Yahoo, Hotmail and Google. It’s called webmail because web browser e.g. Firefox or Internet Explorer is used to access your mailbox. This is fine with broadband connection.  But if you have a dialup connection, this is inefficient and costly since you are charged per minute.

Before Yahoo mail became popular,  we were using email reader programs where you can compose and read your email offline.

If you want to try this option, you have to do the following:

1. Download and install a email client to your PC like Mozilla Thunderbird see Products at  http://www.firefox.com
2. Open an email account w/ Google or Fastmail
3. Go to your email account settings and look for words POP or IMAP. Find the instructions to activate POP/IMAP mail.  Parameters you need are: 1) hostname of your incoming mail. It usually starts with pop, pop3 or imap like pop.google.com, imap.fastmail.fm, pop3.fastmail.fm, etc. ; 2) hostname for your outgoing mails. It usually starts with smtp like smtp.fastmail.fm, smtp.google.com, etc.; and 3)  your password.
4. Enter  those parameters to your client program (Thunderbird) and save the settings.
5. Compose a test mail from Thunderbird.  Queue it. Compose more test mails if you want and queueing them.
6. Connect to your provider using your dialer.
7. Once Internet connection is established, click the Send button. This will send all queued outgoing mails.
8. If you have incoming mail, it will automatically receive them into your Incoming mail folder.
9. Disconnect your connection.
10. Read your mails.

Study your email client. There are lots of features you can find like signature files, email forwarding, CCs, BCCs, etc.

If you don’t know how to install programs,  post a question here.

My relatives and friends abroad are now calling me using their regular phone for free! Even though it only cost them $0.16 per minute to call Philippines via regular phone, it’s a big savings for an hour talk especially now that the gasoline is very expensive in the USA/Canada and the rest of the world.

We’ll before the local telcos start sniffing around to check if I’m a hacker. No. My callers are using landline but it rings to my stand-alone Internet Phone. It consumes only 5 watts. I can leave it on for 24-hours but I turn it off when I go to bed. Anyway, it has a voicemail. I can always retrieve missed calls in the morning. Bottom line … it’s legal.

I wrote the complete details in my http://gcd.i.ph blog.

For Camiguin Internet (DSL or wifi) subscribers, we can support to setup your SIP IP phone. I will demo my setup to some friends and I will bring some IP phone hardwares, too. It will be between last week of April and 2nd week of May.

Finally, SIP phone is perfect for OFWs.

Just visit LanVox Systems for assistance.

I came across this BBC news that Intel is backing Wireless Africa Plan. Wireless Internet and telephony? Yes, I agree this is the most feasible technology for remote areas. Being a pioneer of the Phil-German Rural Telecommunication Network project, I cannot help but worry about the future of the telephone cooperative I started and the small telcos who cannot (or didn’t) keep up with the technology.

In 1994, Camiguin Telephone Cooperative (CAMTECO), started with a state-of-the-art telephone Alcatel S12 exchange. The remote subscribers that are too far from the exchange, are connected via Alcatel’s RURTEL TDMA system. It is the same system used by Telecom Eireann (now Eircom) in Killarney, Galway and Donegal (Ireland) where I underwent training in 1992. However, in 2005, the residents of Black Valley, County Kerry raised the issue of poor telephone service and non-availability of broadband service to the Irish Parliament in 2005.

Giant telecom companies catched the vision what the Internet can offer. So they dropped their expensive DSL services and bundled them in their basic voice services for less than P900/month. And I overheard that video will be bundled,too, for less than P1,000/month in the near future.

The domestic long distance traffic of small rural Local Exchange Carriers (LECs) drastically dropped due to the penetration of mobile networks. Incoming overseas calls also dropped because of email and voice/video chatting

“But how about local calls? Calling via mobile phones is more expensive than landline!”. Hmm. That’s right. But how about VoIP like Yahoo voice chat or Skype. “Too much hassle. I to need to turn on my computer, we need to set an appointment to call and I must keep it running for 24 hours so that I don’t miss any incoming call. No way!”.

That’s the common notion about VoIP. But take a look at this gadget.

This is a analog telephone adaptor (ATA), a class of IP Phone, which I bought for only P4,500 including shipment. Just plug an analog phone(!), then your Internet connection, and get a 9~12V DC supply (from a power adaptor or battery). Bingo! Now you have a stand-alone IP phone. No computers needed. Very handy – about the size of a cigarette pack. Low power consumption,  just 5 watts, you can keep it running 24 hours 7 days!

Calling format is similar to email. You register (usually free) to a VoIP phone provider. You will be assigned a VoIP address. For SIP (Session Initiation Protocol), you address looks like 1234567@provider.com. When there is another SIP phone registered to the same provider, you just dial 1234567. To call SIP phones in another provider, you have to use an access code because you cannot dial letters with your telephone. Access numbers can be found in  SIP-Broker Network Directory. So, just like in email, you can exchange messages regardless if you have a Yahoo, Google,  or your company’s account.  If you want to get into Internet phone, here’s a guide how you can setup your own stand-alone IP phone.

What can you do with your IP phone?

For a start, you can subscribe two lines – some sort of a hotline … a perfect setup for OFWs abroad and their family in the Philippines. Just like email, give your SIP address to others – friends and relatives wherever they are – Cagayan de Oro, Cebu, Manila, USA, UK and even to your neighbor (now this is a local call!). So going back to the main issue. At P800 per month for a broadband connection, you have Internet, email, chat and unlimited free-calls worldwide. The question is – will they still keep their landlines?

Furthermore, the availability of wireless landline service like PLDT’s Landline Plus (I heard this is nationwide) is the immediate threat. Its deployment to remote areas is cheap, easy and quick because they utilize the cell sites of Smart. It has features like texting and limited mobility coverage (usually province-wide) … but there’s no broadband connection! Due to this lack of broadband capability, I guess, that this service is only an interim solution. The final VoIP setup would be a stand-alone. SIP phones are standard units – as of now available only online. In a few years, they will be sold everywhere just like cell phones! There is no need for the telcos to supply the IP phones. Now you can see that broadband connection is a direct threat to local calls, too. It all depends on the pricing of the broadband connection.

Therefore, the bottom line of small telco’s survival – it depends on their competitiveness to offer broadband Internet connection and to market value-added services. Speed of deployment is very crucial. This is no problem with private companies because they decide quickly. They have a better chance of survival. But for cooperatives, plagued with too much red tape, micro-management style (even the size of copper cable to be purchased has to be decided by the Board), lack of experienced,skilled engineering staff to turn technical assets/developments to commercial values/services, lack of marketing staff, and … politics perhaps, will surely be left in the dust and someday, all of a sudden, they wake up with no more subscribers.

Manila Bulletin posted that PLDT’s domestic fiber optic network to reach terabit capacity by year-end. Terabit is a measurement of volume of digital information. Each DVD disk contain 4 gigabytes. In my rough calculation, PLDT fiber network can transfer 31 DVDs per second!  Why?  “To support our economy which has become to be more and more dependent on the power of the Internet ….”.

See … PLDT is now preparing for the increasing demand of Internet vs voice by expanding their Wi-fi/3G wireless broadband connection. I think part of their capacity expansion is to support the Landline Plus service nationwide, too,  which I feel will kill the small LECs (Local Exchange Carriers).  And I suspect that the Landline Plus service is just an interim service to help finance future expansions because it cannot carry broadband connection. The subscribers will have to get a broadband connection because it also carries voice (VoIP). Once the subscribers upgrade to wireless broadband, they can just throw the Landline Plus units away.

For the international connection, “PLDT would also be complementing the DSL capacity by doubling its Internet Gateway to 50 Terabits per second capacity “.  Gateway is the international fiber-optic link crossing the oceans to major points like USA, Taiwan, Singapore, etc.

With this huge capacity, it’s very near that Smart/PLDT will offer voice, Internet and cable TV with hundreds of channels in one package.

February 12, 1994, exactly 14 years ago, was the inauguration of Camiguin Telephone Cooperative (Phil-German Rural Telephone Project). It was also the start of commercial operation of the network. Everybody was excited and busy since it was the culmination of years of preparations since 1990.

Just a few months before the inauguration, Alcatel was busy in the installation of the system – setting up the switch, radios, towers, solar panels, training CAMTECO personnel and wiring the subscriber lines. The time constraint was the curing time of the tower foundation. The Christmas vacation in 1993 gave the project a slack time to finish for the inauguration.

Camiguin was in a state of euphoria. Everybody was busy calling their friends and relatives all over the country and the world! Heinz Pomplun said “Today everybody is excited. Tomorrow it will be a thing of the past. The telephone will just be an ordinary thing.”

Although the excitement is gone, let us not forget to thank the Republic of Germany for donating us a modern telephone system. For the younger generation, ask the elders how’s life in Camiguin without the telephone. Then, you will know the value of the gift we have.

Million Dank unserer deutschen Freunde!

Happy anniversary!