In a nod to my onetime (and hopefully still) friends from the VoIP world, I will say that the Gutknecht amendment to COPE regulating VoIP "up" to the level of regular wireline voice is among the minor nuisances of the bill. As described, the amendment:
[P]reserve[s] FCC authority to require VOIP providers to: (1) Contribute to the Federal universal service fund when they interconnect, either directly or indirectly, with incumbent local exchange carrier networks; and (2) Properly compensate network owners for the use of their network just as incumbent and competitive carriers do today.This means access charges, universal services taxes and all sorts of legacy regulatory obligaitons get put on the new platform. The logic of regulation dictates as much, but among the salutary benefits of VoIP is the pressure it puts on reforming and ridding the copper networks of those archaic taxes and burdens.