Dear Vonage,

I've been meaning to tell you this for over a year, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. I mean, you've been such a cheap date, costing me about $19 per month compared to those expensive hussy phone companies with their $45/month prices. Sure, there are cheaper sluts around, a Skype on every street corner. But how could I pass up a deal like you? I expected good quality of service from you, like I got from my ex-phone service. I figured, hey, I might as well stick with you for another reason, too: I don't really need to see you that often. A plain old telephone service like you is not as useful as it once was. Why? I have a confession to make: I've been seeing someone else on the side. iPhone. You've heard of her, right?

There's more. Even given the iPhone's beauty and all the special things she does for me, it turns out I need a land line like you for specific reasons. You know all these phones we have scattered throughout our facility here that you've had under your wing for the past two years? They're all connected to our plain old telephone service (POTS). Plus, until we get a phone call recorder on our PCs that's reliable enough, we're sticking with our wired-up recording system for all those interviews we do as journalists. But as a land line, you suck, and that's why I'm going to have to break up with you for good.

I mean, really, you bitch. What were you thinking when you just blatantly decided to hang up on that phone call last week — you know, the most important conversation I've had in the past decade? Yeah, that one, the negotiation call that decided my entire future. You hung up on my new boss, and to add insult to injury, I could still hear the poor guy saying, "Hello? Are you still there?", and he couldn't hear me answering him at all. And that's not the first time you've done that. Every time I talk with someone for over 30 minutes or so, you're all, "That's enough, I'm hanging you up." If that's not bad enough, then you go and crash our entire network at the same time in some sort of hissy fit. You know, I gave you umpteen chances, and you kept doing this me, over and over. I just can't take it. Heck, I hear even your own dad thinks you have issues!

Sure, you have some great things going for you. I'm sure some other guys will really like the way you're always ready to offer up that accommodating list of calling activity on your website, and that sexy voicemail system that delivers sound files to any email box. Nice. But one thing's for sure: Those dudes certainly won't appreciate the way you forget to turn off that blinking message light after all the voicemail messages are deleted, and they'll also resent your high-maintenance requirement of adding another layer of routers (or worse, replacing their own router with one of yours) to their broadband systems.

Then there's the clincher. You sound terrible! That's what you're supposed to do for me, right? But no. You won't let me hear anyone's voice at the same time I'm talking — it's called dual duplex, for your information, bimbo. And you're just downright slow. There's that annoying wait for a dial tone, and then there's that exasperating delay in conversations that I've noticed from the start, but I thought I'd get over it after a while. I haven't. This sound quality of our relationship is no better than a common, cheap cell phone. You're not going to change. So it's time to say goodbye.

That's it. I've decided to go back to my ex-phone system. Sure, her name has changed a few times since we were last together, from Ameritech to SBC and now to AT&T, but who cares? She's reliable, lets me talk and listen at the same time, and sounds smooth as butter. Sure, she's more expensive, to the tune of $26 per month more, but so what? I'm done with you, you cheap whore.

Good riddance,
Charlie