Time Warner to Use Cable Lines to Add Phone to Internet Service:
"Time Warner Cable said yesterday that it had signed a deal with Sprint and MCI to help it send telephone calls over lines once used only to deliver television programming. The move escalates the clash between the cable and the traditional telephone industries, and shows how quickly cable companies are transforming themselves into all-purpose telecommunications providers."

Internet technology has made it possible for the cable companies to use their lines — which reach nearly every American home — to deliver telephone service, as well as high-speed Internet connections. Time Warner said it intended to offer telephone service by the end of next year in major markets in most, if not all, of the 27 states it serves.

Several cable companies already offer phone service using an older technology, though worldwide the number is fewer than eight million subscribers combined.

The newer technology, known as voice over Internet protocol, sends phone calls as digital data over the Internet. Customers using the service would plug regular phones into modems connected to the cable wire in their homes. They would be able to keep their existing phone numbers, and the Internet-based calls could be received on regular phones. Refinements of this technology over the last year allow cable companies to offer phone service in more markets more quickly.

In addition to Time Warner Cable, the cable giants Comcast, Cox Communications and Cablevision have started deployment of Internet phone services, with plans to expand those services in 2004.…

http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/09/technology/09PHON.html?pagewanted=all&position=