I've got an invitation to Google Voice. Anybody want it?

Interesting. I had forgotten that it was still invite-only. It's incredible to me that a tool I use every day and find indispensable is still unavailable to most people.

That said, I think I have three invitations if anyone still needs one.

If someone does have a spare invitation, I'd gratefully accept it, as it ties in with a couple of projects I am looking at.

Ror

I'd like one too if any kind soul has a spare invitation going!

Thanks,

Adrian

Dan, would you like to give yours to Rory and I'll give it to Adrian?

Actually, does Google Voice work internationally?

You need a US number to register but after that you can use it anywhere.

Arse. I guess I'll have to wait until they roll it out this side of the pond then!

Thanks anyway guys.

Adrian

A Google bot calls you on the number to confirm the details. People have managed to workaround this by getting a temporary VoIP number from somebody like Vonage.

Or you could just ask one of us to answer the phone for you.

Google Voice is open to the public

One thing I think they really need to get out there is that you can used Google Voice with your existing phone number if all you really want is the visual voicemail features.

So I don't entirely understand this "existing phone number" part. I have Google Voice. I have a phone number with it that I haven't (yet) given out to anybody. Can I port my cell phone number over to Google and then get a new cell phone number? Google says I can't, or maybe I can, but without all the features, or maybe I still can't.

It doesn't apply for you at this point.

The existing number thing is as follows: if you don't have a Google Voice account, you can tell it you want to join using your existing cell phone number. The moment you've done so, nothing has actually really changed. Any calls to or from your phone are still going over your carrier's network and has nothing to do with Google.

In order to utilized Google Voice with your existing number after you've signed up as such, there's two things you can do:

1) follow the Google-provided instructions for setting up GV as your voicemail service. This involves dialing a special number that changes the forwarding number for missed calls from your carrier's voicemail system to GV's.

2) place calls from GV. Using the web interface, Chrome extension, or the GV app on Android its self, you can place a call originating from GV. This, as I've mentioned before, still uses your minutes, but it's VOIP from Google to the recipient. If using your existing number, the ONLY reason this is useful is to place inexpensive international calls.

That's pretty much it! If you sign up for GV with your existing number, you just don't get the ability to ring multiple phones. It's like a GV-Lite account.

*edit*
Actually, I need to correct myself. "Use with existing phone number" has one benefit for existing GV customers who already have a GV phone number. It brought the ability to forward calls to my cell phone number (as opposed to my GV number) to my GV voicemail system. So whether someone calls my cell phone or my GV number, it all goes to the same voicemail inbox, and I still get all the benefits of GV like personalized greetings and visual voicemail.

Looking through the GV features, I think I'm interested in trying it out in the "use my existing phone number" version. I'm curious how it works, though. I mean, at an under-the-hood level, if I'm not changing my phone number, how is it that it can do things like intercept my voicemail messages and change the greeting for different callers?

If I sign up for this, will I lose my Visual Voicemail on the iPhone?

It works by forwarding missed calls. However, not having used this type of setup (I've always had a Grandcentral/GV number), I'm uncertain where you would forward them. For me, calls to my cell phone number get forwarded to my GV number and go straight to voicemail.


I don't know for certain, but I'd bet you would. This wouldn't be a big deal if Apple had let Google Voice into the App Store.

The Google Voice app on Android is killer.

I've been using Hullomail for voicemail since 2008. Its free and the best internet service I use, okay maybe apart from GMail.

Once you sign up you set the busy/unreachable divert on your phone to Hullomail's number rather than your voicemail - Hullomail will then take the voicemail from your caller. Basically it will then MP3 the message and email it to you. Works with practically any email service.

The neat stuff is actually the GMail integration. If you have a GMail or Google Apps account, it will link up with your contacts - so say if Tony leaves me a message, it will look up his number in my contacts and send me an email saying that Tony left me a message. It'll have Tony's email address as the reply address, his contact icon as the MP3 album art and all the ID3 information correctly populated. Neat. Works for missed calls too where people get diverted but don't leave a message. Of course, it will label these messages for you.

Other neat features is the visual voicemail application, you can get this for Android, iPhone and BlackBerry too. Works just like iPhone visual voicemail and is linked to the read/unread status of the voicemails in your email inbox.

Plus, it has a standard voicemail number to call (and PIN if you call from a number that is not yours) so you can treat it like a traditional voicemail service if you want to and hear the lady ask you to press a button to hear your voicemails. So the whole service even works perfectly if you don't have a smartphone.

Works in the UK and the US too. Really recommend it.

Sounds neat! However, much of that stuff is done by Google Voice as well, and you don't get much more integration with GMail, as it uses the same contact list.

I think your service sounds pretty good if you don't have an Android phone, but if you do I MUCH prefer to use the Google Voice application so that I don't get MP3s emailed to me. Instead it streams the messages to you (and naturally the downside is that you have to have a data connection). When I open the message in the app, it shows the transcript and a play button. As I play the message, it highlights the translated words! If I want to hear from a particular section of the message, I can just press the word I want to start from. It's pretty neat!

Also, have I mentioned how GV integrates with GMail? I can set up GV to email me when I receive a voicemail, and it will send the transcript along with the play button right in the email. This is nice if I'm at the computer, so I can click the play button and when it's done it will mark the message as read in GV.

Then there's the other little features I like, such as the ability to block callers by number, personalized voicemail greetings, and more.

There's also a service called YouMail that does the same thing as HulloMail. I used it for a while with my work-provided Blackberry, and my VoIP provider is now using it for their voicemail (which I rarely use). It also has a transcription feature, but you have to pay for it, which I had no real desire to do, so I have no idea how well it might work.

Google Voice does sound really good - looking forward to giving it a go when it eventually comes to the UK and so long as my number doesn't change.

I signed up to Google Voice with the help of a friend in the US.

I tried using the Android app for make a call but it doesn't work properly. It always fails with some unknown error and the recorded message tells me to try again later.

I'm mostly using it for the free US text messaging as most of my friends in the US appear to have a text messaging bundle. So the inability to make calls isn't actually a problem for me at the moment. I've noticed that if you get sent a MMS then Google just silent drop it without notifying you.

Yeah, that's my #1 gripe about Google Voice. The service itself is pretty essential for me, given that I have to keep my cell phone in a locker outside our office suite all day. But, now that I've given everyone my GV number, I have to then tell them that whenever they send me an MMS, to send it to my mobile number. Of course, they think my GV number *is* my mobile number, so then they end up changing my mobile number and not sending to my GV number anymore, defeating the purpose of having it in the first place.

I don't know enough about how GV works to know if it's an easy fix or not, but it's really annoying.

It is a little silly having a GV number for everything except if you want to MMS me then you need to use this other number but only for MMS.


The way MMS works is that you should get a SMS that contains details for your phone to download the extra media. Even if Google don't support MMS, just having it send you a SMS that says "<blah> tried to MMS you but we don't support it" would be better than how it is now where people send you a MMS and you don't know.

I think I've gotten one MMS in my entire life. Why send a picture via MMS, and pay the high cost to send it, when you can email it for free?

Not everyone has email access on their phone. On a smartphone it doesn't make much sense to use it, but there is still a high percentage of people with normal phones capable of MMS.

That's all true, but it still seems like such a thing to do for teenagers. I can't imagine sending an MMS to one of my friends, even the ones that don't have smartphones.

First of all, if I have a photo worth sending them, I don't want them viewing it on a 2" screen**, which is the largest you're going to see it on if you have a dumbphone. And that's the other part I don't like - that you can't easily offload the image to a computer (at least, the people who have the dumbphones won't know how to do it if it's possible).

Personally, if I didn't have a smartphone, I would still want people to only email me photos.

I know, though, that there are plenty of people who do use MMS. I just think it's a dumb technology


** one of the worst social tortures is when someone says "oh, I have to show you some pictures from my trip!" and then expects my wife and I to huddle around their cameraphone while they step through the photos they took with it.