The free international text messaging service WhatsApp plans on offering free telephone calls beginning in 2015.
The new service, similar to VOIP, had been announced two years ago and was to begin this year but was delayed due to various technical problems.
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So much has changed since the American government broke up AT&T’s monopoly on that country’s telephone services. New technologies have caused the cost of international calling to plummet and Internet services like Skype now let people make video calls for free.
The mobile telephone industry which had its break put in the 1990s was said to herald the beginning of the end of the land telephone line. Now, after only two decades, the cell phone providers are themselves under threat of becoming obsolete.
Such a telephone calling service would revolutionize the mobile device industry and is could moot the need for cell phone companies in their entirety. People will no longer need to pay for telephone lines and could use their smart phones to call people wherever there is a Wi fi network. Such networks are becoming more and more available, either for free in various locations, both public and private, or as pay services where one can get Wi fi connections anywhere that they go.
Android apps can also be installed on a PC using something called Bluestacks which is a software that allows users to turn their desktop computers into Android compatible devices. This means that when WhatsApp begins to offer telephone calling as a service it could also mark the beginning of the end of the local phone company too.
