Intent on being Japan's top broadband operator (high-speed web, telephony and interactive TV), Softbank's BBTechnologies has already laid pipe for 85% of the population.

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Industry observers expect the trend to only continue, as both mobile phones and Web-based telephony continue to increase in popularity.

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Everyone knows traditional landline telephones are becoming less important, what with the rise of both mobile phones as well as free or low-cost Web-based telephony products like Skype.

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Microsoft says it will use the company's software, people and intellectual property to accelerate the delivery of its unified communications vision, a vision bringing together various technologies including e-mail, instant messaging, short message service, telephony, and Web conferencing.

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While Google is best known for its Web search service, it has been pushing aggressively into telephony.

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Another web development that looks set to have a good year is internet telephony.

BBC: The internet in 2002