Ooma is a new company that lets people use their home phones to make and receive calls for free.

Users only pay for the hardware (a pricey $400) once and have free unlimited calling anywhere, forever.

All that is needed is a broadband internet connection -- Ooma plugs in to that and your phone. No phone line (or phone company) is needed.

The Ooma hardware is beautiful and functional. Answering machine, speaker phone, & conference calling are built in.

Users can add special ring tones and other features that have only been possible on cell phones.

The Instant Second Line feature enables you to pick up any phone in the house and place or receive a new call, even if another phone is already in use -- and it uses your same single number, so no second line/number is needed.

Ashton Kutcher -- of Demi Moore and Punk'd fame -- has also joined Ooma as Creative Director. Ooma's management has an interest mix of backgrounds from Cisco, Apple and Yahoo.

What Ooma is attempting is relevant to marketing for 3 important reasons:

• We work with clients that directly or indirectly are in communications.
  
  
• Ooma is bringing real innovation to the category. Instead of a better model of an existing phone company and competing on the same plane, they are drastically changing the user experience itself offering features never possible before, and through that redefining what a phone company should do. I compare this leapfrog in innovation similar to what Nintendo's Wii or Apple's iPhone have done in their categories.
  
  
• More companies like Ooma are emerging that are tearing down walled-in legacy systems and are instead creating open networks, open devices, open content and open applications. Google is attempting this with its entry into the mobile carrier space. Its threatening to existing companies and business models, but its resulting in a better experience for the customer. This is happening in most categories to some degree, fueled by the open access and power of the web.
  

Perhaps the most important aspect of "new marketing" is usefulness, and anything that thinks about the customer first will be useful and a good thing.

Sunday is a new company offering 24/7 personal assistance over the internet.

For $29 for 30 task requests, users can simply write an e-mail to Sunday to have any task taken care of. You can send your travel itinerary and they’ll book you flights or find a hotel with specific amenities and rates. You can give them the name of your dentist and get an appointment, make dinner reservations or track down tickets to a sold-out show.

For $20 per hour, you can have someone run your errands, pick up groceries and - my favorite - even wait on line for you at the DMV.

Sunday’s agents can also give you a wake-up call in the morning, tell you the weather, and send you an e-mail in the middle of the day to update you on sports scores.

Could brands offer this as a personal service to their loyal customers? Integrating their own best service or product features?