Almost free world?

Yes I know, I haven' wrote for a very long time although I promised it. That's life....
I discovered yesterday that almost everything can be done almost for free. I was shocked. I am not referrin here to minor things but to things that are really expensive. For example:

1. VIDEO STREAMING
Take for example thesolution DarwinStreamingServer + MPEG4IP + ImToo or VLC => in no time I can create a powerfull enough streaming server thatcould support hundreds of streams even on my not so powerfull machine. OK. In order to make it a commercial grade solutin what I have to so? I have to invest about 2000 EUR in a Apple XServe G5 and in some bandwith from a decent ISP and I have a good VOD server. If I could talk to a wireless operator I could offer him a cheap/pretty powerfull solution for streaming. If not I will keep the ideea as a hobby. BTW: Proprietary solutions cost well over 20000 EUR.

2. TELEPHONY
The catch here is VoIP. Especially SIP. There are many solutions that could be used to talk for free. I am not reffering here to Yahoo, SkyPE, GoogleTalk or so bu to a custom based solution. AsteriskPBX + X-lite(or any other SIP phone - even hardware as ZyXel). In a couple of hours of configuration and tests I was able to create a working solution that enabled me to talk to my friends. Add to this a E1/SS7 interface and you will be able to create a goood solution for a company. Not the best, but very near to a commercial grade one. Add alsoa wireless router and some WiFi phones and you could use it to provide voice to distant/hardly accesible spots.
If we add to this also som IM features we are in heaven.

3. Software Defined Radio
This is WOW! Just imagine how nice it would be to transform my PC - a junk -into a UMTS/GSM/anything immaginable radio/tv using only a cheap board... GNU Radio Project is great...

If you don't believe me check those out:
1. Darwin Streaming Server - http://www.apple.com/quicktime/streamingserver/
2. Video Lan Client - http://www.videolan.org/streaming/
3. Mpeg 4 IP - http://www.mpeg4ip.net
4. Asterisk PBX - http://www.asterisk.org/
5. SIP Express Router - http://www.iptel.org/ser/
6. YATE - http://yate.null.ro


A plethora of information can be found at:
http://www.voip-info.org/wiki/