Quick Guide to Calling Home From Overseas

(This is a School of ROK Quick Guide--less of a blog post, more of a tutorial. I mean, why should you have to learn the hard way what someone else has already found out? You can find our other guides on our sidebar. Enjoy!)

So what if you're living on another continent. That's still no excuse not to call home! This (very brief) guide will help you keep in touch with mom--without busting your budget. All thanks to your friendly neighborhood School of ROK.

VoIP: Why You'd Be Stupid Not To Use (Something Like) Skype

Seriously, Skype is so totally sweet you'll think I was paid to write this. Skype, as you may know, is an international peer-to-peer VoIP (Voice over Internet Protocol) provider, which basically means it turns your broadband-connected computer, wherever you are in the world, into a dirt-cheap phone service. (This article goes into a little more detail on the technology, which is pretty cool--the peer-to-peer aspect is what helps keep the service so cheap.) Calls between Skype members are completely free--think voice chat over AIM. Outgoing calls from anywhere in the world generally cost about $.02-$.03 per minute. The Skype Voicemail add-on ($10/3 mo., $30/12 mo.) provides full voicemail functionality regardless of whether your computer is running, and the SkypeIn add-on ($18/3 mo., $60/12 mo.) buys you a traditional phone number on which you can receive completely free incoming calls.

Now, there IS a disadvantage to Skype and similar VoIP programs (thanks, Greg, for the tip): the lag on a VoIP phone call can be as much as double the lag on a conventional phone. Of course, this isn't noticeable on most domestic calls, but for an intercontinental call, it can be kind of a pain.

But still, the overall handiness of Skype can't be overestimated. Let's say you grew up in Pittsburgh--just hypothetically--and you wanted to give a bunch of friends and relatives there an easy way to keep in touch. With Skype, you could buy a 412-area-code number . . . and all your friends and family could reach you in, say, Korea, for only the cost of a local call.

. . . which is great, if you want to hear from your folks every weekend--and at odd hours, to boot. If not, of course, you're probably best off with an old-fashioned calling card, in which case you'd best pop over to Calling Cards.com. The rates are a bit higher than Skype's, but if you're not planning on calling home often, given Skype's roughly $90-per-year overhead, the savings are probably a wash.

(If you've enjoyed this School of ROK Quick Guide, you can find more on our sidebar or on our schoolofrok.blogspot.com.)