I forgot to say I dropped my landline about 6 months ago and use only my cellphone now. Since I get 0-3 calls a week, I'm using Virgin Mobile Pay-as-you-go service. Although I'm considering changing to Cricket for similar service since they charge $1 for any day you use the service, doesn't matter how long you talk. I think that would extend my budget a little further and let me make long phone calls during any single day. But I'd have to get a new phone..... I was looking at the options for VOIP phone service, starting with Magic Jack but had made no decision. I'll take a look at that NetTalk service. Magic Jack now has a stand-alone hardware based system too, sounds like similar pricing. If a company sells "phone service", they must support the 911 location services. When you buy home VOIP service, one of the things you must do is register the equipment address for use with the 911 system. But if they don't sell phone service, they don't need to provide 911 info. I think that is why Google Voice was usually not advertised as phone service. It is just VOIP service that happens to let you make calls to outside phone numbers. Maybe that has changed, but that is the way I understood it a couple years ago.... I have to say that the main problem I have with Internet-based VOIP service is that when power fails, so does the phone service. If you drop power anywhere along the cable/DSL line back to your local head-end, you loose Internet and VOIP at the same time. I'm not 100% sure it is the same with DSL service, but since your cable or DSL router probably shut off when power did, most likely your phone service did too. OTOH, an old fashion POTS (Plain Old Telephone Service) landline telephone keeps working because it is powered by batteries at the central office feeding your area. I'm not saying that DSL service didn't quit, I don't remember for sure, but I could still pick up the POTS phone and get a dial tone as long as the wires were not broken. If you want to have phone service in an emergency or disaster situation, POTS phone service is the way to go. In any major emergency you SHOULD NOT rely on your cellphone for emergency aid. In any really major event, cell towers go down or simply become overloaded by too many people trying to use them and not enough circuits. In a major event, like the I-35 bridge collapse a few years ago, the big news organizations come in and the first thing they do is dial up several cellphones so they have a permanent connection to their studio. And they don't hang up till they go home. If you chew up 10-20-30 circuits that way, there is little enough for the rest of us (and emergency officials) to use. Remember, the capability of any specific cell tower is based on the daily expected usage by people in the area, plus a small factor for peak use. Just because it is "the phone company" doesn't mean the resources are unlimited. When power failed on the eastern seacoast a few years ago, people couldn't call out on their cellphones, but they were able to send text messages because text requires a lot less bandwidth. Doug.