>why would they buy a .tel when there's other namespaces with more freedoms?

What freedoms are you referring to?

>I'm not sure that this is as practical a benefit as it sounds. If you were to ask me what my ".tel" is and I responded, just use "andrew.tj.id.au" you'd plug it in and use it.

Fair enough, it would be great to reach that point!

>I'm not clear on what benefit this outlines?

Search. That's what I'm working on :)

>Agreed on both accounts. The later is part of the reason for my lack of enthusiasm for it.

But it works :) And from a developers perspective it's easy - there's a bunch of apps you can play with (iPhone, Blackberry, softphones, etc).