Google voice heard 'round the world  |  March 31, 2009  

I've heard some discussion of Google Voice changing the telecom industry in fundamental ways. I personally don't see how it could have as much impact as Skype and other VoIP related approaches had, but I may have missed it.

This new Google Service (essentially a re-launch of GrandCentral, which Google bought in 2007) allows you to choose a local phone number, which will simultaneously ring up to six phones such as your cell phone, home phone, office phone, and the phone at your vacation location. It also supports speech-to-text to transcribe voice mail (similar to what Jott provides), but takes it further, since it's possible to search for particular words in voicemails. Google Voice can also send and receive SMS text messages and set up conference calls.

It's not available to everyone yet, there are some interesting perspectives available. It did make me wonder what kind of enterprise IT options may exist. I assume it currently only supports integration with the existing Google applications.