The internet has come a long way since its inception. You can now log on to an instant messenger and talk to a friend in real time while miles away or share photographs with relatives in the next town over (or both at the same time!) from the comfort of your own home. However, there is a method of interaction that we all use infinitely more every single day, but probably give little thought to: vocal communication. While Web 2.0 content is increasing our interaction over the internet, telephony still has yet to hit a big boom. In this talk at the O'Reilly Emerging Telephony Conference, Trevor Baca explains how recent Web 2.0 innovations can be applied to emerging telecom technologies.

Traditionally, Baca explains, the telephone systems of the world have remained closed to outside interaction. Sure, just about anyone can pick up a phone and make a call, but how many people can give input as to how a phone system should be run, or decide what features customers of that system have access to? Freedoms such as these are becoming an increasingly big part of web interaction which has spawned services such as user maintained databases of service and product reviews, voice over internet protocol, and social networking sites. What if the same ideas that led to these innovations could be re-molded for and applied to telephony? In this presentation, Trevor Baca will lead you towards an answer to this intriguing quesion.