Advanced

Google introduces phone services

Posted by Scott_Ruecker on · 8 comments
BBC News; By Maggie Shiels 		Mail this story
Print this story

Google has strengthened its mobile services with the debut of a service called Voice that could be a challenge to Skype and other phone firms. It lets customers make cheap international calls and gives them a speech-to-text feature for voicemail. The services are available thanks to Google's acquisition of phone firm GrandCentral which gives users a lifelong universal phone number. "This could be big. Google is seen as disruptive," said analyst Jon Arnold.

Full Story

  Nav
» Read more about: Story Type: News Story

» Get new stories by e-mail: nightly or as they are published

« Return to the newswire homepage

  Related stories
» More like this

Comments (8)

Sander_Marechal ·
What's the underlying tech? I really hope they went with a proven, open standard like SIP just like they did with Jabber/XMPP and Google Talk.
jacog ·
Hmmmm, I have used the Google Voice (and webcam) thing in the past, and it required some Windows-only browser plugin.
Sander_Marechal ·
After some cursory Googling around I think that it's not based on SIP but can interface with SIP. It looks a bit like a glorified vCard for VoiP services instead of a complete VoiP solution.

We'll see. Many people have already commented that unless Google starts offering SIP for this it is likely to fail, as the world is divided between Skype on one side and a horde of open SIP providers on the other side. It's unlikely that a 3rd walled garden will fit in between.
Bob_Robertson ·
> It's unlikely that a 3rd walled garden will fit in between.

I agree. I'm not sure what Google can offer to differentiate themselves.
tuxchick ·
Quoting: I'm not sure what Google can offer to differentiate themselves.


Yeah, AOL already cornered the market on jailbait chatrooms, so if google wants a successful walled garden they're going to have to come up with something else. I suspect they'll take the opposite approach and use open standards, and figure out something to pull disparate services together, since that is the trend now anyway. Even for microshaft, sort of, with their 'unified communications', which of course is code for 'another way to glop MS cr@p together and make the same customers pay new money for the same stuff, but with a different name, and still not interoperate'.
Sander_Marechal ·
@tuxchick: At the moment Google Voice isn't using open standards. I hope they'll switch to SIP though. It's the protocol of the future.
theduke459 ·
I always find myself wondering why an organization that insists on using its own, dedicated email domain would not insist on similar control and branding for voice and IM communications?

Ultimately I think this service will have only a niche appeal.
gus3 ·
Plus, their own, ah, "flexibility" on privacy matters doesn't recommend them well for something like this.

Post a comment

A free account is needed to post. Write your comment here first: your text is kept in this browser while you sign up or log in, and is waiting for you when you come back.

Your message:
|||||
10
Markdown: **bold**, *italic*, [text](https://link), - lists, > quotes, $x^2$ for math. Formatting help

Sign up and post (it is free)  or  Log in and post