I remember about four or five years back that you could use a service like dialpad.com (now a pay service) to call anywhere in the US for free using your computer. Do any free services still exist? (I’m trying to contact someone in Vermont doing this.)
If you use Skype to call a landline in the continental US, it costs 1.7 Euro-Cents per minute (at the current exchange rate, this is 2.22 US cents per minute). If you can get your friend to download Skype as well, you can call for free.
Personally, I have never used the program, but I have heard good things.
Unfortunately my friend doesn’t have any type of microphone or headphone for use, so calling their computer using a computer would be a one-sided conversation. 
That, and they only have slow dialup. As for the pay for use thing, I’ve literally got no money in the bank to test it out, unfortunately. :\
Bummer. My long-distance GF and I had great results with Yahoo! Voice Chat. MSN Messenger’s Voice Chat is comparable too. You just need to have a good soundcard – the headsets are pretty cheap. Mine was $14.
I remember in '99-'00 you could find hundreds of these free services. There must still be at least one left. :\
It seems that the calls to land-lines (as opposed to PC to PC calls) are pretty much all pay now.
Which is good for me, because one of those companies is employing me!
I don’t see any. I remember net2phone let you use the first 5 minutes free, but I assume you’ll be calling for more than 5 minutes.
Maybe your best bet is to find a PC to phone service that allows you to buy as many or as few minutes as you want. Many minutes cost about 1-3 cents for US calls. It won’t be free but it’ll only cost you about $1 on your debit or credit card to make your call.
I’ve used MSN Messenger for free to speak through computers.
Why do you need any particular service? All you need is MSN / ICQ / etc. and one of those dinky PC microphones.
Yep, you can use Skype and Messenger. You can get a headset/mic DIRT cheap and get on with it or sign up for a monthly plan and ditch your home phone all together…
My company recently launched VoIP service for a Canadian dial-around company and as far as our research, VoIP in the traditional subscription model ($20/mo for unlimited N.A. and reduced INTL fees) is going to hit a much, much lower price. We have been using VoIP phones in our house for more than a year. The quality is getting much better and I never have to look at the clock to see what time it is before calling my mom LD, or my hubby international when he is in Toronto.
VoIP is perfect for travelers…even if you use the free services. It is hella cheaper than the outrageous hotel fees and roaming mobile. Speaking of mobile, there is a move toward having auto-enable for hotspots and VoIP mobile. That will take some time, of course. Probably more than you want to know, but I’m down with the flu and a bit on the rambling side… 