One of the oddest things about all of the standards that exist in the world of legacy telecommunications is the various manufacturers’ seeming inability to implement them consistently. Each manufacturer desires a total monopoly, so the concept of intero- perability tends to take a back seat to being first to market with a creative new idea. The ISDN protocols are a classic example of this. Deployment of ISDN was (and in many ways still is) a painful and expensive proposition, as each manufacturer decided to implement it in a slightly different way. ISDN could very well have helped to usher in a massive public data network, 10 years before the Internet. Unfortunately, due to its cost, complexity, and compatibility issues, ISDN never delivered much more than voice, with the occasional video or data connection for those willing to pay. ISDN is quite common (especially in Europe, and in North America in larger PBX implemen- tations), but it is not delivering anywhere near the capabilities that were envisioned for it. As VoIP becomes more and more ubiquitous, the need for ISDN will disappear. |
telephony