>Since when is this ability to dial-in such a hard requirement? Any time you have groups at two companies calling each other it's going to be a decently common

>Since when is this ability to dial-in such a hard requirement? Any time you have groups at two companies calling each other it's going to be a decently common requirement. Each company has X people in a conference room. Those X people need to all be able to talk and hear. Thus you use the room's audio equipment which is basically an expensive telephone to dial in.