If you've never heard of Internet Telephony, get ready to change the way you think about long-distance phone calls. Internet Telephony, or Voice over Internet Protocol, is a method for taking analog audio signals, like the kind you hear when you talk on the phone, and turning them into digital data that can be transmitted over the Internet. How is this useful? Internet Telephony can turn a standard Internet connection into a way to place free phone calls.

The practical upshot of this is that by using some of the free Internet Telephony software that is available to make Internet phone calls, you are bypassing the phone company (and its charges) entirely. Internet Telephony is a revolutionary technology that has the potential to completely rework the world's phone systems. Internet Telephony providers like Vonage have already been around for a little while and are growing steadily. Major carriers like AT&T are already setting up Internet Telephony calling plans in several markets around the United States, and the FCC is looking seriously at the potential ramifications of Internet Telephony service.

The main motivation of development of IP Telephony is the cost saving & integrat ing new services. Internet telephony integrates a variety of services Vocaltec introduced the first Internet telephony software product in early 1995, running a multimedia PC, the Vocaltec Internet Phone. In 1996, Vocaltec announced it was working with an Intel Company (Dialogic Corporation, an Intel acquisition made in 1999) to produce the first IP telephony gateway. The technology has improved to that point where conversations are easily possible. Gateways are the key to bringing IP telephony into the mainstream. By bridging the traditional circuit-switched telephony world with the Internet. Internet telephony technology has caught the world's attention..