Today the most popular free app in the iPhone App Store is Skype. In a post I made in over a year ago (iPhone SDK means a smaller world) I waxed philosophical about the iPhone becoming Dick Tracys watch one day if VoIP was allowed, something Apple had blocked in early versions and later allowed in iPhone OS 2.0, but only over WiFi. Restricting VoIP to WiFi is surely a concession to AT&T in an attempt to preserve presious 3G bandwidth until they build out the capacity of their high speed cellular network.So, here we are, a year later and one step closer to the reality of wide spread, easy to use, video conferencing on a mobile device.
BTW, rumors say that iPhone OS 3.0, due out in summer of 09 will allow VoIP over 3G if you get the new iPhone hardware also expected to be released at that time. Further rumors say that a built in, user facing video camera (ala iSight) will be part of the newest iPhone hardware. Now, I am not a rumor mill, but this is a great one. Let's just cross our collective fingers...