Slashdot Mirror
Goodbye, Google Voice
itwbennett writes "The trouble with Google Voice is that the way we use phones has changed — and it hasn't kept up with the times: 'Fewer people have a mobile phone and a business line and a home line that might make One Number For All so. Text message costs (which are actually close to nothing) are almost always bundled into contract costs. Automatic voice transcription, while still a mean feat, is no longer such a magic trick,' writes Kevin Purdy in a blog post explaining why he's breaking up with Google Voice. The main problem is that, despite some very cool features, Google Voice doesn't play well with others — even apps in its own family. And it doesn't look as though that's going to get better anytime soon." I've been very happy with Google Voice for a few years now, and one reason is the transcribed voice messages, which may get hilariously garbled sometimes, but are almost always correct enough to be useful.
Is when you need to provide a phone number for verification purposes and either don't want to use your real number, or your are verifying several things and need multiple numbers.
Google Voice is not being phased out (yet) by google.
This is just some doosh on itworld ranting about junk on his blog.
I use Google Voice as my primary phone number. This is because (like Stephen Hawking), I am quadriplegic and unable to speak due to Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS or Lou Gehrig's Disease). I use it to text and for the relatively few "voice" telephone conversations I have (using my eyegaze computer which - via text-to-speech - "speaks" what I type). I use it for texts daily and for at least one vocal conversation a week (I use web-based video conference multiple times per week to conduct my biomedical and technology research business).
I have something in common with Stephen Hawking...
Maybe it is a good headline because it caught my attention and drove me to comment. Being backwoods senior citizens, my wife and I use google voice all the time. No cell service where we live so we stay in touch with our family and our volunteer activities without paying for long distance using google voice. Besides, some of us less dexterous seniors need a keyboard to respond to texts. Google if you are listening, don't dump voice cuz some yuppie in a metro area has a bug up his a**
Is that you? To reiterate another poster's comment, this is just some dude's blog entry.
Seriously? WTF with the headline, Timothy? Is /. Into sensationalist, eye-grabbing headlines now? How about maybe only showing comments 5 at a time while you're at it? That should garner some ad revenue. That title is *very* misleading.
Some of the complaints in this blog were mentioned in a post by a google employee 4.5 months ago:
https://plus.google.com/u/0/+N...
... rest assured, weâ(TM)re working to support SMS messages for all Google Voice phone numbers ... we are listening and working hard to make this happen, but we need to work with carriers and this can take some time.
It will take some time before Google Voice is fully integrated into Hangouts, and we appreciate your patience along the way.ï
there is also mention of third-party apps which, on android, use various methods to achieve VOIP through Google Voice on the handset, which isnt a feature that Google Voice currently allows (it must route your call via an actual phone call).. these apps have been warned that they will be no longer to do that by May 15th of this year..
im guessing that we will be seeing some changes to Google Voice in the coming few months... maybe even things that make this itworld blog post seem kind of silly.
(disclosure: been using google voice since its first year, wish it could be better... 'breaking up' with it over the stuff in TFA is silly, some of those gripes are silly)
I use Google voice exclusively. It allows me to have a phone number separated from my service provider which I probably won't have forever (so I don't have to worry whether I'll be able to port my number over). It allows me to make phone calls from my computer for phone interviews and the like (headset/mic so I can type). It also allows me to text people without paying Verizon a dime for bullshit reasons.
-SaNo
Those are for when you are driving and it is so much easier to just leave a VM. Also, when the background noise in the car makes a dictated e-mail look like it written by a drunk, illiterate wombat.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
I use Google voice exclusively. It allows me to have a phone number separated from my service provider which I probably won't have forever (so I don't have to worry whether I'll be able to port my number over). It allows me to make phone calls from my computer for phone interviews and the like (headset/mic so I can type). It also allows me to text people without paying Verizon a dime for bullshit reasons.
I use GV in exactly the same way for exactly the same reasons. I just seamlessly "ported" from one wireless provider to another a few months ago. Unlike "real porting" I could use both phones while I was getting things setup and switch my inbound call routing back and forth between the devices at will.
This article is just some hipster douchebag's whiny blog. I tagged this slashdot headline as troll.
Of course, you *do* have to worry that Google is planning to subsume Voice into Hangouts. That decision is so obviously retarded it can only have something to do with Google's attempt to make Plus get traction. Oh, and maybe someday GV will support MMS. It's annoying that those messages get blackholed.
I was convinced Google Voice was next on the chopping block after they canned reader. The iOS app hasn't been updated in over a year, and they broke gmail GVoice calls awhile back. But they've now added Google Voice support to Hangouts, which leads me or believe it's going to morph into a Hangouts feature instead of a standalone service.
ralphbarbagallo.com
Where is native VoIP support? That's the feature that would be most appealing, the ability to make and take calls to other 'real' phones from devices with only data access as a native feature.
I know there are other third party apps that can do this like Skype or Line2 and there are apparently back-door ways of doing with GoogleVoice (which according the the Google blog post quoted above aren't supported).
But I always expected this to be a Google Voice feature and it hasn't been.
Say goodbye to Kevin Purdy.
I use google voice a lot.
Every so often it would just not record a call at all. Which meant people left me messages and I had no clue.
I LOVE voicemail transcription. In fact, I wish they'd just get rid of voice mail entirely and make everything text. But at the very least, carriers should offer voice mail to text messaging. It can't cost anything. The computing power is marginal and the text costs are zero.
I've decided to stop wasting my time responding to AC trolls/sockpuppets... so if you want a response from me... login.
It is getting hard and harder to deal with Google outside the USA. In the old days you could buy Nexus phone using a VPN and a friend in the US as the shipping address. Now you have to have a USA issued credit card and many times they know you on a VPN. My Google Glass invite will expire in 2 days which pisses me off because is my $1500 not as good anyone else in the USA?
Google Voice is simply another case in point. On May 15th they will block 3rd party apps, effectively disconnected people who uses Google Voice outside the USA. The native Google Voice app demands you verify against the USA phone number, which is fine while you are visiting the USA but once you leave it will stop working when you get a new phone or the app is updated. Groove IP was a great work around and allows you to join those US based work conference calls for free but would cost via Skype. Also handy to contact US based associates that don't have 24/7 VOIP app running and Skype has never work 100% on mobiles.
BTW I would love to hear suggestions for open source VOIP apps that would work as alternative to Skype? I can't say I seen any that can find peers without a commercial service or PSTN behind it.
....they've always been worthless content free clickbait, but it seems like we're seeing them more often lately.
In my experience SMS is broken with Google Voice... no group texts, no attachments, randomly misses texts completely. Highly unreliable.
But I kind of like this about it. Nobody texts me anymore.
Probably not much of a selling point though.
Look up: Obi202. It's a small box that allows you to use Google Voice not just as "call forwarder" but as your primary phone number via VOIP.
Technological progress has merely provided us with more efficient means for going backwards. -- Aldous Huxley
I still use Google Voice because it's free (well, I suppose it's not free because they are collecting my data, but I have a feeling the carriers are doing the same anyway). How can you beat that? Sure, I'm only able to use it at home and through WiFi hot spots, so it's only a little bit better than a landline, but I'm not getting gouged by the cell phone companies for a couple of GB a month.
Now someone will respond to this and tell me what great cell phone service they have that's not available in my area and is still garbage for the price ("See? The system works for me. Why isn't it working for you?")
One thing the article nailed:
"MMS messages not only don't come through, there's no notice that someone tried to send something."
Most users don't know the difference between SMS and MMS (and why should they?), so it requires explaining to other people why you only get some texts and not others.
I do like the spam number blocking feature, though, and I'm afraid that once I port it over to a real phone I'll get more telemarketer calls than useful ones.
It's also great if you have a mother-in-law on the other side of the world. The cost per-minute for calls from phone to phone (she just cannot seem to figure out Skype) is as good as any provider.
My wife talks for an hour and it's just a few cents. Or at least that's how it seems. Plus, we can do all kinds of other tricks with voice to text and other things.
I was about to get really pissed if this story was about Google pulling the Voice service.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Ok, so is there some *OTHER* free number you can get and keep forever that will let you forward it to you?
Is there another free *real* phone number you can get and answer on the computer? (SkypeIn is available but that isn't even close to free).
Also, the author is mixing up Google Voice the Service with Google Voice the app. Some of the "problems" depend on the app you use. That's true with "normal" SMS messages too. Not all phones/apps show emoticons - and I've never used MMS in my life. Google voice was originally designed to forward calls, and didn't even do SMS back when it was Grand Central.
Anyway instead of MMS, you can use email if you have a fancy smart phone.
Tektronix was a great company at one time; everybody in the tech world was impressed with Tektronix oscilloscopes. I suppose the good managers decided to move to other efforts. One problem was that Tektronix was not prepared for lower-cost competitors.
Having known somebody employed by them who was frustrated with the changes at the company, I think there is a bit more to it. Some of it is the sort of thing that hit all of these companies - the MBAs took over.
For Tektronix, however, I really wonder if it wasn't the end of the cold war that really caused a shift in technology spending. If you watch any of those 80s videos on SDI (Star Wars) or other big defense contracts you'll always see Tek blue-green in the equipment racks. Their niche was making the best gear money could buy, and it seemed like Tek was constantly selling stuff to aerospace contractors. If you're building some radar system designed to evade the best jammers the Soviets could build, that is the kind of gear you need to test it. Technology was a huge priority in US military buildup during the cold war. Today that niche is much smaller than it used to be.
But, I'm not in this field personally, so I could be missing something. It seems like great companies often fail once their founders are no longer running them day-to-day. I've always argued that the founder does best (just the result of selection - you wouldn't have heard of the company in the first place if they didn't do a good job). Then their hand-groomed successor takes over and that usually goes reasonably well (the Tim Cook / Ballmer - perhaps the "exception that proves the rule"). Then the executive search committee takes over and it goes all downhill.
Actually, the problems MS has goes all the way back to Gates and the fact that the model just doesn't work any longer - Ballmer has stayed fairly true to the MS of the 90s. Often companies go down because companies abandon the corporate culture that made them successful. I suspect that MS and Apple may fail because they don't abandon it quickly enough.
Wait! One dickhead stops using Google Voice and that earns a frontpage article on Slashdot??
SERIOUSLY?!?
Ok, come the fuck on!!!
Can this site make even a minimal effort to not be total shit? For quite a long time, Slashdot was very educational and informative but, over the past few years, it has sunk to near-uselessness. It's only because some people steadfastly refuse to give up despite the fact they are fighting a losing battle that the site isn't entirely crap.
One guy stops using Google Voice and that earns a Slashdot article.
Wow.
I use Google Voice as my salesman number. Anytime a request for info, or quote request, requires giving a verification or call back phone number, I use my Google Voice number. Mine does not combine my numbers. Most helpful for night shift workers.
My Google Voice number does connect ro a free IPKALL number, which connects to a free SIP account. The free SIP account is accessed by a Linlsys PAP2T-AT which gives me a free phone line and number to give out. Call screening features work great. GV allows placing calls on a PC, and ringing your SIP phone so you don't use any airtime. Texting makes the number appear as a cell phone. Keeps you from getting texts all day to your cell. I text salesmen beck at 2AM that send sales pitches.
Most of the time it silently goes to voicemail, unless i'm expecting a verification call. When I expect a call, I turn on the ringer, or login on a laptop if in the field.
Google's handling of Google Voice is getting an enormous amount of bad public relations. Google often makes changes without adequate explanation. See, for example, this information from Google: An update on Google Voice.
Obviously, no one considered the effect on Google's reputation of the fact that Google employee Nikhyl Singhal communicates in an inadequate fashion. For example: "Ward Mundy, Nov 1, 2013: +Nikhyl Singhal Your suggestion that developers have violated Google's terms of service and posed a security risk is disingenuous to put it charitably."
Dear Kevin,
That is pretty cool, I guess. Not that I care what you think.
Signed,
Everyone else
while(1) attack(People.Sandy);
Google Voice is still great for having a spam-box phone number you can give to places that require a working phone number (car dealers, political organizations, etc.), but you don't really want to hear from. But if that's how it ends up being used, I don't think that's going to convince Google to keep it around. You can tell it's been unloved for some time now... The iPhone app (at least) was updated once all of last year, and the only thing in the update was a warning if you try to txt 911. (So it was probably prompted by a legal issue.)
Maybe now that Google has a mobile phone OS and has to work with all the mobile carriers, there's outside pressure to hold Google Voice back. Well if it goes, so much for my spam-box.
...synomous with being spied upon. Because of their past goodness I would like to defend them, but when even the login to their services defaults to "staying logged in" even though they present that staying logged in could be a security risk makes one question Google's ultimate motives here. One would think that if Google truly valued privacy above all else Google would do what ever it takes to keep their user's secure above all else. I hate to hate on someone who has done me so good in the past, but what Google does in the present is what counts.
Time is what keeps everything from happening all at once.
As a backdoor user, here is how to do it. The only cavot is you can not dial out with the desk phone hardware.
Step one. Get a free SIP account. There are several providers, pick one. A SIP account will have an account looking like an email address/ User at provider format.
Step 2. Get a free or paid DID (direct inward dial) phone number. This gives GV a number to forward to. Link it to your SIP account.
Step 3. Get a SIP client, either a softphone for free or a ATA/IP phone. Connect it to your SIP account.
Now you have a number GV can call. This works well for international travel. Take your IP phone with you. Family can call on your local GV number. Google forwards to the local IP Call number to link to a plain SIP VOIP call that you can take worldwide.
Google Voice is a rather tiny product that a relatively small portion of the user base ever uses. Which is good, because they'd almost certainly kill it if it did take off, since it makes pretty much no revenue, and almost certainly loses quite a bit of money per user. (Really, I'm not sure why they keep it going at all... I don't even see a glimmer of a viable business plan here.)
I really doubt anything Google does to Google Voice (including simply pulling the plug) would have an "enormous" amount of bad PR.
In other news, I had hotdogs today. Though I suppose that would be on slashdot too if I had written a fucking dissertation about it. Who gives a fuck if some random jackass stops using one of Google's apps?
Doctor
Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
Free and low cost phone numbers are available from multiple sources. This is not a unique property of google voice.
to see the next hollywood blockbuster movie.
See? We can play that game too.
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You mean there are *non* drunk / illiterate wombats?
bork bork bork!
Google voice works great for those that hop between prepaid wireless providers. I've switched providers several times in the past few years and didn't have to deal with porting my number around (some mvnos are better than others when it comes to porting)... I just ported my long time cell number to GV and now it doesn't matter what phone number I have on my cell... Everyone can keep calling my "old" number at GV and it rings my cell. And if I lose or break my cell phone I can quickly repoint GV at another number (or not, since I get voice mails and sms's in my email so don't really *have* to answer the phone)
I have a huge number of tabs open now of discussions of Google Voice. People with technology backgrounds are saying negative things about Google and Google management.
Sure, most of that will be read only by technologically-oriented people. But a perception of bad management makes it more difficult for Google to hire competent people. (It will always be easy to hire people who are not competent with technology.)
And it's not just this one issue. There are many other issues of Google management receiving the same criticism: People are saying Google is sloppily managed. That is degrading the public perception of Google. Degraded public perception makes ALL management of the company more difficult.
And . . . thank you for saying what I was going to say before I said it.
How'd an insensitive clod such as yourself get a four digit slashdot UID? I can already see you have a very low IQ, but it's the low UID that fascinates me. Did you inherit it? I've heard that idiocy can be congenital.
The latest salvo was when I upgraded my T-Mobile branded phone. It took me nearly an hour of Googling to find the information on Google which told me how to fix what multiple cellular providers have broken, and I can't find any way around the sim lock which prevents Google Wallet from doing tap-to-pay.
In my experience, SMS/voice mail/TTP are broken by cellular providers attempting to keep Google off of their networks (except as a search provider prioritizing their products and services).
Sheesh, Google Voice isn't going anywhere.
And by the way, those of us with jobs will always have more than one number ...
Holy crap. Fuck you, non-editors.
I'm home office. We just moved. I don't have to get a lot of customers to update my contact info, my phone number stays the same.
Sometimes I go into the corporate office. My work number rings my desk phone there too.
My work number rings my home office phone, my corporate office desk phone, and my cell phone. My cell phone is not a great only phone. Since the demise of flip-phones, people tend to have a hard time hearing me on "candybar" style smartphones that do not get long enough to reach both my ear and my voice.
In my case, it's convenient.
I've never used transcripting or anything else. To me, it's only a phone number. I have seen a few voicemail transcripts from GV. Tremendously terrible. Not worth seeing again, so that feature is disabled.
This dipshit deliberately wanted everyone to believe that Google was discontinuing Google Voice, when what he really should have written was "I'm leaving Google Voice because I don't need it."
Asswipe.
My heart skipped when I saw that headline. I have used Google Voice since it came out. I use it as my main number because I can forward it to any number. It comes in very handy because I probably have had about a dozen phones since then and don't have to keep giving out my number. I use it on my resume. My phone is always off (I'm on a minute plan so I use it to make calls for that reason also), but I'm always on email so I am able to see when someone has called. I listen to the messages online. I'd be SOL without it.
And insulate your other numbers from telemarketers and change of service. Filtering and transcription. Awesome.
Google voice remains relevant. I don't even want to bother reading the actual post. As a user from grand central days before google voice was google voice, the service remains just as viable and vital in my day to day life. So much so I don't even want a voice plan with my cell phone but carriers won't capitulate to that request on a cell phone purchase. 1. one number rings my cell, my work desk, gmail browser windows a. any given time, I'm 99.9 % likely to be near one of those. 2. caller filters a. unknown numbers are sent to vmail immediately b. friends get their own vmail greeting c. family always rings d. work gets routed to voice mail when I'm not on call and its not 9-5 during the week. 3. emailed notice of voicemail and texts 4. transcribed voicemail along with mp3 of voicemail 5. jobs and thus work phones come and go, cell phones come and go - the google voice # remains an ever constant 6. normal cell, outside cell reception, no call history of calls while outside reception area, gvoice shows missed calls etc once back in reception area. The only gripe is attachments to txts/sms messages are not sent to the gvoice client on android and no notice that there was an attachment either. 80% of the time the attachment can be found in my email copy of the txt. annoying esp when mass txts about birthday parties are sent and I don't even receive notice it was dropped. Or that google would reply back and say Recipient does not receive sms, please use alternate protocol.
..just because you can, doens't mean you should...
meh - post was originally all nice and formated, but after submit, became a blob 8( oh well, sorry
..just because you can, doens't mean you should...