Taipei (臺北市) put its RFP for a citywide wireless broadband network out to bid in July 2005. 20,000 access points later, and they are set to officially launch 20 December. The mayor of Taipei, Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), is ending his second term with a technical demonstration. He will use Skype to talk the mayor of Tao Yuan, at the other end of the country, showing how the city's wifi service is not just for e-government but for everyday phone calls too. They'll be using the free-1 USB phone (which is Mac compatible) and the Ipevo view-1 video camera from Taiwan's own Ipevo.

What would it take for Skype to become the defaul telephone system for all of Taiwan? Will muni wifi help Ma Ying-jeou run for president in 2008? If you're there, please post photos to flickr, and tag them Skype.

Guest blogger: Jan Geirnaert.

I wonder when I will be able to get it in South-East-Asia. Emerging markets, yet, but no place to get it here.

I want to buy a wifi-phone that supports other software too. I want it to have a phone number too. I want it to have preloaded credit too, and I need it to have a cd-rom in a pouch with all that software on it. Then also I want to be able to get drawn back to the store to top up my credit. Therefore the store will have to provide me with a phone with a built in account.

Why else would I go back ?

see also:

• Accton Teams with Skype to Make Internet Free Calling Even More Accessible - news release announcing Accton phones bundled with Skype
• Accton VM1188T 802.11b/g VoWifi Phone

"Since July, the 27th Skype Global Rate will also cover Poland, China, Greece, Taiwan, Hong-Kong and Switzerland. Other prices are also being lowered, although not to the SkypeOut Global Rate, in the Czech Republic (mobiles), Bulgaria, Slovakia, Croatia and Finland."

"27th July is the first anniversary of SkypeOut. This is a reason to lower the price to 0.017 Euro per minute."

This is my rough translation of news from Dziennik Internautów, Internauts Daily, reported to Skype Journal by Tomasz Tybulewicz, Gdansk, Poland: "Since tomorrow evening SkypeOut users will be able to make cheaper calls to Poland. Poland will be covered by SkypeOut global rate at last. Prices to Polish mobiles also will be a little lowered."

Taiwan market: Skype subscriptions exceed the two million mark in July. Subscriptions for the PChome-Skype peer-to-peer (P2P) voice over IP (VoIP) application surpassed two million earlier this month. In addition, the number of paid user subscriptions for the SkypeOut service is close to 150,000.

[DigiTimes]