Who Owns Your Wireless Service? Crooks Do
As a personal hacking project in my spare time, I switched from T-Mobile to anveo and an asterisk setup.  I can send and receive SMS on my server and can make WiFi calls on my phone.  SMS gets sent to my email as well.  This costs maybe $45 USD a year.  I've thought about documenting my setup but I don't know if there is any interest.