Regulate Obstacles.
A political power attack.

BigCos have beefy political muscles. Small ones don't. If you're big you think of this as a benefit of size and experience. Small fry see this as an overwhelming, unfair advantage. 

Political muscle comes from big taxes and patronage. Local and long distance phone companies use their influence on regulators, like America's Federal Communications Commission and state and provincial agencies. They've also lobbied law makers for more nearly 150 years, going back to the telegraph. Samuel Morse worked with Maine Congressman F.O.J. Smith to lobby the U.S. congress for federal funding for his electric telegraph, back in the early 1840s. Did I mention they've mastered this by now?

Telcos use government to create new opportunities and to defend their turf from effective competition.

Some telcos convinced governments to outlaw Skype or legislate expensive technical barriers to operation. In the United States, incumbent telcos lobbied for emergency service (e911) to increase operational costs and complexity. The hope was to slow the entrance of Skype, Vonage and other VoIP providers and to raise cost and complexity for smaller, nimbler companies.

National carriers blocked or banned Skype in several countries (China, UAE, Mexico, Belize, Jordan, India), although this trend seems to be changing. In some cases, political power pushes regulatory agency attention away from an incumbent's aggressive tactics.

Three fronts affect Skype's future:

Net Neutrality for a Fair Playing Field.

Should your Internet carrier be able to charge you for VoIP minutes, above and beyond what you pay Skype? Or make your Skype calls slower than calls made with their own softphone products?

You don't want folks messing with your bits. Net neutrality is a policy: carriers should just carry traffic. No discrimination based on the content of that traffic. Neutrality advocates say government has a role in keeping the Internet fair, neutral, and open to all. 

eBay's government relations staff supports net neutrality as do nearly all web businesses.

Open Wireless (Wi-Fi, Wi-Max) Networks for Hybrid and Wi-Fi Skype Phones.

Net neutrality for wireless broadband. Google is lobbying congress for 'open' wireless networks. Susan Crawford's been following the Senate's hearings on the 700MHz auction. If your phone or laptop uses Wi-Fi, without this, Wi-Fi access providers can choose to block or cripple Skype.

Mobile Carterfone for Unlocked Access to the Mobile Phone Network.

As long as you're paying for mobile service, shouldn't you be able to use any gadget you like? Skype picked this fight with a brilliant petition to the US FCC earlier this year. Attach any device to the mobile network instead of only getting locked phones from carriers. The incumbents are lobbying hard against this.

Political power is real, complex, and not for the faint-of-heart. Political power can buy incumbents time to fight, to adapt and to change the battleground from disruption to status quo.