Voip teleophony - Anyone know Packet-8 or others?

[Travis Roy]

>>The relentless criminal prosecution and legal harassment of hobbyists
>>who buy satellite smartcard gear also makes this unattractive.
>>There are some people who make a living selling systems which defeat
>>the DRM on satellite signals, which is illegal, but at least DirectTV
>>subpoenas entire customer lists from vendors and start sending the
>>goons instead of adhering to some standard of evidence of illegal
>>activity.  Grand, ain't it?
> 
> 
> I'm wondering when the telcos are going to start going this route.
> With the ability to build your own phone system and move over to a
> completely VoIP solution without a major phone company in the middle
> so simple and getting easier everyday, it's only a matter of time
> before they turn to litigation-based profit maintenance.

There's a BIG difference here...

VoIP hardware/software is legal. So is Sat TV stuff.

The difference is basically this, you can't really do anything illegal 
to "steal" service with VoIP hardware/software, but the sat TV hardware, 
some of it specifically, is usually only used for one purpose.

I know three people that got DirecTV hacking letters. One person settled 
(for $3000)  because he was stealing DirecTV service. The other had his 
lawer write up a letter saying basically "prove it" and never heard 
back. The third sent a letter and got dragged into court and ended up 
losing (because he was stealing service) and had to pay $5000.

I think it would be near impossible for say Verizon to prove that you're 
stealing verizon phone service if you set up your own Asterisk box. 
After all, if you eventually hit a PSTN line, you have to pay for that 
some way or another, or if you have a DID number in, you have to pay for 
that as well.