The latest Cringely has some interesting analysis about why Adobe bought Macromedia, but skip past all that an read the part in the middle about ipDrum:
Mobile Skype Cable and comes from a Norwegian company called IPDrum (or will come when it ships in August). The cable connects a mobile phone to your computer. The illustrations all show one phone and one computer, but the power of the system can only be realized if you have at least two phones.
One phone stays at your PC as the interconnect with Skype. I'm hoping the cable also charges the phone, but that, again, isn't made clear. In the simplest case you could probably pick up the phone and use it as a dedicated handset to speak over the Skype network. But the true power of the Mobile Skype Cable comes from having multiple phones and some kind of family billing plan.
I'm a Verizon mobile user and so is Mrs. Cringely. Our Verizon plan allows unlimited calls between our two phones. Now imagine one of those phones (or a third, they cost $9.99 per month each here in Charleston) is attached to a PC back at our house. By calling that phone and using the IPDrum software that ships with the Mobile Skype Cable, I can be linked directly to Skype where I can dial a second call over the computer network. Since the mobile call is free and the Skype call is free, suddenly I can make unlimited mobile calls anywhere in the world. Even more powerful, by linking my Skype and mobile numbers through the IPDrum software, any Skype user anywhere in the world can call me for free.From PBS | I, Cringely . June 23, 2005 - No Flash in the Pan
Referenced Tue Jun 28 2005 10:23:46 GMT-0600 (MDT)
But, of course, ipDrum is just software and it's not magic. You could imagine other software that connects a cell phone by your PC to your Vonage account as well as your Skype account, for example. Scott Lemon's been working to use a cell phone with an unlimited SMS messaging account as a way for a PC to send SMS messages. Walled gardens have weak walls anymore.