On the one hand, VoIP is voice telephone service. On another, it's an information service.

If you place a call from your PC to another PC -- as you would for connecting to a VRS service provider -- the entire call travels over the Internet via packet switching. The packets traverse different routes. All arrive at the end point because each carries with it the destination address. The packets are reassembled at the receiving PC, as if they all came in together. That means that VoIP is an information service. Your call is free. There are no long-distance charges, no matter how far the packets travel and no matter how long the call lasts.

However, you can place a VoIP call from a regular telephone, either to another regular phone or to a computer. You might do this when using a TDD and calling to a phone that is concede to a TDD or when calling an Internet-based relay provider. Costs are much lower than are circuit-switched long-distance charges. Either way (phone-to phone or phone-to-PC), part of the call runs over the public switched telephone network. That part of the call is a traditional telephone call.

Experts in telecommunication expect that, in time, most Americans will make most of their phone calls using VoIP or a similar Internet-based technology. It is more efficient and less costly than are traditional telephone calls.

This, however, raises some questions, notably: How should this new service be regulated?

If VoIP is to be considered to be telephone service, then the providers must comply with the rules of the public switched network. Notably, they must collect and pay universal service charges. They also must comport with section 255 of the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which requires accessibility for persons with disabilities in telecommunications products and services.

If, on the other hand, VoIP is to be considered an information service, neither of these rules apply.

That could be bad news. Deaf and hard of hearing Americans, along with many other people with disabilities, need to have a strong and well-financed universal service fund. Universal service is a cornerstone of American telecommunications policy. It is what makes phone service affordable and widely available even in very rural areas. It is also the foundation for e-rate, the program that allows schools and libraries to secure telecommunications products and services at just a fraction of their commercial cost. And it is the basis for section 255.

Universal service will not survive in a world of free or low-cost Internet-based phone service. Nor will disability access.

One solution is to regulate VoIP neither as a telecommunications service nor as an information service. Rather, it is so much of a hybrid that it needs to be seen as an "advanced telecommunications capability" as defined in section 706 of the Act.

Congress should determine that what matters with VoIP is the function it performs: it delivers telephone service. For that reason, its providers should be subject both to universal service and to section 255.

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