[AusNOG] Phone Numbers in Australia

[Mattia Rossi]

Chiming in a bit late, but I agree, numbers do not count anymore.

a) most people don't remember any number at all. It's saved on the phone 
and you dial the name. It's of course also based on the "all inclusive" 
cost models

b) businesses run on VoIP Systems, which are integrated with any form of 
address book, presence and instant messaging. Again you dial people, not 
numbers. Heck, when you use Skype4Business or Jabber or Circuit or 
whatever, most of the time you do not even dial a number, but a sip 
address. If federation between the systems is in place, this goes even 
beyond the business boundaries

c) your business number is portable and can be used on any voip/sip 
enabled, connected, smart device. I for example wouldn't even need any 
mobile number if it wouldn't come with my mobile plan. Calls to friends 
are made via Whatsapp or Facebook messenger or more rarely Skype. No 
numbers there. Skype4Business is on my mobile, so my Business number is 
on my mobile. And I'm available on that number anywhere in the world 
where I have Internet connectivity on my phone. But I wouldn't need it 
either, as I could receive calls via my SIP identifier (my business 
email address). No number needed.

So my view is: phone numbers are legacy. Back in Switzerland they did a 
massive haul over of many businesses in the last 5 years, introducing 
modern SIP based Communication (Skype4Business, Circuit, Jabber, Mitel) 
and realised, that phone numbers where really just there for people 
without those systems to reach them. So what they did, is to move mostly 
over to the 058 block, which is geo-independent and derived from a 
premium number block (there was some discussion about costs which got 
solved by the incumbent who owned the block by eliminating the premium 
in the end). The rationale for that was, that nobody would know about 
the real location of a number anyway, and geo-dependent numbers would 
actually make a relocation of a business unit to another region quite 
confusing (which over there happens more often than here in Australia 
because of much smaller regions).

It messes with emergency services though, which usually rely on the 
geographic identifier of the phone though.

That's where e112 and friends come into play then.

Cheers,

Mat


On 1/05/2018 8:56 AM, Mark Tees wrote:
> I am kind of wondering if we can get to a stage of complete number 
> virtualisation. Mainly so when I’m overseas I can more easily direct 
> actual inbound SMS how I see fit. Have also had the same number for 
> almost 10 years.  At present I hook up an Android phone and 
> send/receive SMS via email or forwarding with normal call diversion.
>
> Ideally, I could port my number to a virtual mobile service and 
> receive calls via SIP of whatever then receive SMS via API calls or email.
>
> From the carrier VOIP side it would be awesome if we could receive SMS 
> in a similar fashion as SIP.
>
>
> On Tue, 1 May 2018 at 07:36, Matthew Moyle-Croft <mmc at mmc.com.au 
> <mailto:mmc at mmc.com.au>> wrote:
>
>     Previous thread about fake caller ID made me think about what
>     phone numbers mean in the Australian context.
>
>     Historically we’ve had numbers that are geo based for landlines
>     (02, 03, 08 etc) and other numbers that delineate the cost to call
>     (eg. 04 for mobile, 13/18 for fixed cost non-geo or free, 1900 for
>     “premium” etc). But we’re now looking to a future where a range of
>     factors are meaning that the differentiation is less meaningful.
>
>     A _lot_ of people are moving, because of generation change, NBN,
>     etc to only have a mobile number. Many people are on mobile or
>     “fixed line” plans where calls are all-inclusive so knowing the
>     cost of a call from the phone number is pretty much irrelevant. My
>     parents and some of my grandparents (yes I still have them)
>     basically use mobile only and don’t answer home phones *because*
>     of the scams on home phones!  I don’t actually know what my
>     brothers and sisters home phone numbers are.
>
>     There’s still a historic “interconnect” charging model/market
>     between telcos that I suspect is just as painful as when I last
>     looked at it.
>
>     What is the future for voice and calls in Australia? Do
>     geo-numbers make sense? Why shouldn’t I be able to have an 08 xxxx
>     xxxx number as my mobile number? (I know the back-end
>     charging/porting reasons, but we’re looking forward not backward
>     here).
>
>     Even calling internationally - voice calls now between countries
>     are generally so awful to use (delay, crappy audio etc) that even
>     for business calls I use things like
>     Facetime/Facebook/WhatsApp/Hangout calls where the voice is so
>     good and low delay I can’t tell where the other person is from.
>
>     I suspect nothing much will change and that’s primarily because
>     the major telcos with mobile networks want to continue to make
>     money out of charging each other for calls, but, even that I
>     suspect will all fade away.
>
>     We do get attached to phone numbers - my Australian mobile is one
>     from the dawn of GSM in Australia and I’ve had it now for more
>     than 20 years and even though I don’t live in Australia at the
>     moment I keep it running on a long life prepaid! So, don’t think I
>     lack sentiment here.
>
>     MMC
>
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>
> -- 
> Regards,
>
> Mark L. Tees
>
>
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