AllFreeCalls (un)Surprisingly Successful

AllFreeCalls, a new service which lets people make free phone calls by first calling a phone number in Iowa and then calling to any of dozens of other countries, just added eight new countries to the permitted lists (plus Antarctica). In an email the founder also said that they handled 80,000 call minutes yesterday.

The company operates under a legislative loophole that gives rural telco’s a kickback on every received call. That kickback is greater than the cost the company bears for making outbound international calls. So someone’s paying for these calls (other telecos? taxpayers?), just not the person using the service. I love bureaucracy.