Well Sunrocket is dead.

Lucky for me my $99 for 1 year was up end of Aug so not much lost. The phone is still working but rumor has it being killed COB today so we'll see.

For now I got Verizon porting my number back to a POTS line and they are coming to finish the install on the 27th (next Friday). I went with a basic unlimited local, no regional/long distance. I'll use the cell for that. This will allow me to watch the VOIP market and see where the dust settles.

Another VOIP provider is going out end of Aug, allo.com. Seems like there dropping like flies.

I'm leaning to going with AT&T CallVantage. It's $24.99 a month for unlimited but I would get a $5 discount for being a AT&T Wireless customer. Add the $2.50 for FCC and e991 fees and your at $22.49 a month for unlimited local/regional/long distance. Their services has been rated number 1 for voice quality for 3 years now and AT&T is not going to close it's doors overnight and if they where not making money on something this long, they would not be in it.

I think VOIP as a whole is going to be in trouble. Vonage while gaining 166K members in Q1 of 07 lost $77 mil. Their stock price at the end of the other day was sub $3. That's getting close to getting de-listed from the Exchange.

Other providers like Packet8, Viatalk, etc will all start feeling it soon. While the technology is getting there, the WAF or Wife Acceptance Factor is not. Also with the big bell's and cable companies offering all in one service deals with one bill and Americans getting lazier by the second, these little guys are not making the numbers they need.

Let's look at SunRocket special deal I had. $99 for one year. Unlimited calls and long distance (no international). $99 across 12 months is $8.25 a month. Seeing as my family averaged around 700 mins a month, that's .01 cents a minute. Now figure that Sunrocket needs to connect to legacy providers, have a fat Internet pipe to handle the traffic, staff, electric, etc, .01 cent a minute is not paying the bills. You can see why they failed.

I'll report back as I get more info.