Wll traditional phone service become obsolete?

I was opening up some mail today and came across the phone bill for my business line. That bill always annoys me. When I originally installed the line, I was told that because it is for a business, it costs $10 a month more than a residential line. So, even if I make no long distance calls on it, it still costs me about $50 a month. This month it was $60.

Our home line does not have long-distance on it and it costs less than $25 a month. If we want to communicate long-distance, we use MSN messenger, email, Skype or our cell phones. We don’t miss having long-distance on our residential phone line.

The only reason I have a business line is so I “sound” professional. For a while I used my cell phone, but I like having a separate line. That way, if I’m working, I only pick up my business line if it rings and vice versa if I’m not. I like to separate my “home time” and “work time” when I need to.

But it got me thinking today how much longer I will need a traditional business line. It’s tough to keep up with technology today. When I was in college, a “virtual assistant” didn’t even exist. Now, I can run a business virtually and theoretically maintain a client relationship without ever hearing their voice or meeting them in person. I have a webcam (though most of my clients don’t) a headset to communicate over Skype (for free!), a resource to share tasks and files, and just about every other technology I could possibly need and the one thing I haven’t been able to find an acceptable work-around for is my business phone line.

Any suggestions?