Hvorfor har vi fortsatt telefonnummer, en standard som er videreført i nesten samme modell siden fasttelefonens tid? “This is my next” skriver følgende om temaet — og de er som vanlig spot on:

“I hate phone numbers. They’re a relic of an outmoded system that both wireless and wireline carriers use to keep people trapped on their services — a false technological prison built of nothing but laziness and hostility to consumers. In fact, I can’t think of a single telecom service that is as restrictive as the phone number [...]

Yet the phone number remains stubbornly fixed with a single carrier and single device, even as consumers begin to move every other aspect of their lives to the cloud. And the more I think about it, the more ridiculous it seems: Why can’t I open a desktop app and use my wireless minutes to make VoIP calls? Why can’t I check and respond to my text messages online? Why can’t I pick up any phone from any carrier, enter my phone service information, and be on my way, just as with email or IM or Skype? Why are we still pretending that phone service is at all different from any other type of data? The answer to almost all of these questions is carrier lock-in — your phone number is a set of handcuffs that prevents you from easily jumping ship, and they know it.”

Vil vi, i løpet av de kommende årene, se slutten på telefonnummerets (eller kanskje spesielt mobilnummerets) leveår? Jeg tror det. Tenk bare på hva som har skjedd de siste månedene: Google (med Google Voice/Talk), Apple (med iMessage i iOS5) og Microsoft/Nokia (med oppkjøp av Skype) gjør alle store satsninger på områder som frem til for kort tid siden har vært totalt reservert telefonen og telefonnummeret; tale og SMS. Telefonens to viktigste kjernefunksjoner. Les mer utfyllende om temaet i “This is my next”s kommentar.

Dette er veldig interessant. Mulig jeg kommer tilbake til dette i nær fremtid.