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Google Voice – One Number to Rule Them All

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Google Voice is not new. It was actually launched in 2009, and for the past 4 years it appears to have grown at a steady pace. At first it was hard to see where it was headed, but as technology progresses, the optimistic observer has to give credit to Google’s forward thinking. Google Voice, or its equivalent, is the future of telecommunications.

Allow us to explain.

VoiceFor those who don’t know, Google Voice is one of many free services offered by Google. If you have a Google account, you simply visit www.google.com/voice to sign up and receive your very own Google Voice number. (If you don’t have an account, they are free and easy to register for at www.google.com).

Once you’ve established your number, you can control how you use it and when. For instance, you can have the number ring your cell phone, home phone, or pop up a voice call on your computer. Or you can have it do all three. You can control which phone rings based on who’s calling, or what time of day it is. You can screen calls and even listen in to voicemail as it’s being left (just like the good old days of screening calls with your answering machine).

But all of those very cool features are not what have us so excited.

The thing that will ultimately revolutionize telecommunications is this – callers are no longer reaching devices, they are reaching people. One might even postulate that, in the not so far off future, phones will have gone the way of the 8-Track.

Imagine this. You won’t need a phone at work, because incoming calls will open a browser window telling you who it is, and give you the option to answer or ignore. Then you move to your car to head home, and the phone system that came integrated when you bought the vehicle will tell you if a call comes in (many new cars already come with this technology, though it usually requires a cell phone to be in the vicinity). Then you get home, and a call comes in while you’re cooking dinner. With the touch of a button you can talk normally and have a conversation with a loved one half way around the world, while you’re elbow deep in potato salad.

In the future, we won’t have an office phone, a cell phone, and a home phone. We will have one number that reaches us no matter where we are. When we’re on the move, calls will pop up on our tablet devices. We will be completely connected at all times.

Does this freak us out a little bit? Kind of. Is there a little part of each of us that doesn’t want to be reachable every moment of every day? Perhaps. But change is coming. And if you can’t stop progress, you can at least reserve yourself a cool phone number.

818-818-8181 Anyone?

 

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