Amended from UK News Headlines:

LIFE STYLE EXTRA (UK) - More than half of all Brits could be using computers to make their telephone calls within five years - signalling the final call for conventional telephones, according to a new study.

By the end of 2006 experts predict 10 million of us will be using VoIP - Voice over Internet Protocol - the technology which enables ordinary telephone calls to be transmitted over the internet using broadband connection.

Customers can download free software from broadband providers - like Wanadoo, Skype and BT - to enable them to make free calls from their PC to other people anywhere in the world with the same software. Calls to landlines and mobile phones incur a small charge, but are still much cheaper than conventional calls.

Wanadoo spokeswoman Sasha Kennedy said conventional phone companies will have to 'buck up their ideas' if they are not to lose revenue as the new technology becomes more popular.

She said: "Certainly costs for VoIP are very competitive and will come down in the future. I'm not sure whether the traditional phone call will disappear totally, but fixed line operators certainly need to buck their ideas up.

"Services at the moment necessitate having an existing BT line anyway. At the moment the service is offered as a secondary option in addition to a standard phone.

"For example, for a family with a teenager who likes to make a lot of calls, he or she could be using VoIP, dad could be surfing the net, and mum could be using the landline - all at the same time."

Wanadoo predicts that 19 per cent of the younger generation will make the change to VoIP next year while a quarter (25 per cent) of over-50s will embrace the new technology.

And VoIP will take off most quickly in Scotland with 32 per cent taking up the service in the next 12 months, according to a YouGov poll commissioned by Wanadoo.

However BT bosses hope the uptake of other paid-for services offered through broadband connection will counteract any loss of revenue from traditional phone calls.

Giles Deards, for BT, said: "We have decided to embrace the new technology. Currently only about 0.5 per cent of call traffic is being made over the internet, but VoIP is something we are seeing more and more people use.

"However BT anticipates that eventually all calls will be made using this type of technology. The latest statistics say that a third of people in the US and Europe will be using it come 2009.

"Through broadband we will offer other services as well as VoIP. These include monitoring services - where a sensor picks up movement in your home and can send a signal to police or your mobile phone - as well as television through the internet connection.

"Yes, the business model will change but B.T. thinks this is a really exciting way to promote the benefits of broadband."

Wanadoo claims that wireless broadband is on the increase, with one-in-10 people preparing to use the net from the bedroom, garden or even their bathroom.

And 2006 will also witness the rapid ascendance of the podcast with half-a-million new radio stations due to be set up online