I'm currently working on a trial, and I thought I would share a tidbit that has come in handy for me. I'm spending some of my time working out of a trial site that is just a block from the courthouse, a central location to house our exhibits, for co-counsel to meet and discuss strategy, and for the attorneys to work on submissions to the court. The location is great, except that AT&T coverage is somewhat weak in this area and completely nonexistant inside of the building where we have our trial site. Plus, we have few phones at the trial site, so I have lots of reasons to want to use my iPhone as a phone to, for example, call back to the office.
However, while we lack cell phone coverage, we do have Wi-Fi internet access here. And because I have the free Skype app on my iPhone plus I still have a few dollars of Skype credit on my account left over from last year, I can easily make calls on my iPhone just by using the Skype app for the low price of only about 2¢ a minute. I reviewed the Skype app last summer when I traveled to Russia, and for all of the reasons that Skype worked great on a hotel Wi-Fi in another country, it works great at a trial site or any other building in the U.S. where you have Wi-Fi but your cell phone coverage is limited to nonexistent.
I don't have Skype configured for me to receive calls, nor do I want to have to give people a new number to call. But people can easily send me an e-mail which I receive on the iPhone and then, as necessary, I can call them back via Skype.
If you find yourself in a situation like this, I encourage you to download the free Skype app and put the minimum amount of Skype credit on it (which I think is $10). So far, I have spent less than $0.50 using Skype while at this trial site, and the ability to use my cell phone when otherwise there would be no coverage has been worth a heck of a lot more than that.
Click here to get Skype (free): 
