Warsaw - Talking on the phone will be free within a decade, Niklas Zennstrom, creator of the globally popular free internet communicator Skype predicted Thursday in Warsaw.
'Skype's vision has always been to make everyone around the world talk for free,' he said.
'In ten years' time all telephone calls will certainly be free, whether you're calling someone on a computer or telephone,' he said.
Zennstrom also outlined a revolutionary Skype project in France which allows all Skype users there to make free calls to land-line telephones in the country.
'This is a ground-breaking move with free Skype calls to land lines - we wanted to see the market reaction and what it does for our users before we do it in other places,' Zennstrom said.
The Skype founder said there were no plans as yet to repeat the project in Poland where free voiceover internet protocol (VoIP) calls offered by Skype have gained the communicator a whopping 8 million users.
Zennstrom was attending a panel discussion co-organized by Poland's Grupa Onet.pl popular website portal and Skype.
Also attending the debate was Lech Walesa. The legendary leader of Poland's freedom-fighting Solidarity trade union that peacefully defeated communism in 1989 admitted to being an enthusiastic user of internet telephony.
'Information should be as free as possible,' said Walesa insisting the free flow of information could act as a catalyst for the development of various interests, economic and otherwise.
© 2006 dpa - Deutsche Presse-Agentur
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