[lsb-discuss] LSB conf call notes for 2007-10-31

[Theodore Tso]

On Mon, Nov 05, 2007 at 10:13:25AM -0800, Wichmann, Mats D wrote:
> It's free to the conference organizer.
> 
> But it's not a toll-free number, Linux Foundation is
> not providing those any more since the merger (these
> seems to be an ongoig trend, and really s*cks for people
> who don't have a company picking up their tab, although
> I believe LF has offered to make some sort of calling
> card arrangement for those to whom this is a burden)

What's going on is that cost per-minute/per-participant for using the
traditional conference call systems can be more expensive than the
cost of using one of the pre-paid calling cards.  When you add on top
of that fact that some of us have phone plans through Vonage or our
local cable companies which have unlimited calling within the US for a
single fixed costs, using some of the "free conference calls" systems
does make a lot of sense.

People using calling cards have to hit a few more numbers, but it does
save the LF a lot of money.  Some of the pre-paid calling cards even
have a VOIP feature which allows you to use a open source SIP client
to connect from your laptop, which can be convenient when you're
overseas and want to keep costs down.

						- Ted