Nokia are making phones with wi-fi that’ll enable them to make VoIP calls. (They’re not the first, incidentally).
I’m guessing that Orange, and some of the other networks, won’t be offering these phones in a hurry to their customers. The networks are desperate enough for revenues as it stands. They certainly don’t want us making free calls when they could be earning revenue.
As things stand, the phones that get market share are the phones that are adopted by one or more of the networks. If your phone’s not adopted by a network to offer to new customers or upgraders with a subsidy, then you’re just left with the unlocked phone market where phones sell at significantly higher prices.
At the moment, this unlocked market is pretty small, but a move like this from Nokia could increase things. The only problem is that large numbers of outlets on the high street are now aligned with one or other network. So where do you buy these unlocked phones?