Call me: 123-555-1212. Sure, Go Ahead.
Thursday, April 09, 2009 | 
~
Ari Blackthorne™
Sweet!In Second Life, you often see in people's profiles the whole "RL is RL and SL is SL and never the two shall ever meet." Fair enough. I can understand that. Just like the real world there are a lot of weirdo-wacko's in SL.
There also are a lot of people who don't give it a second thought. They are comfortable with themselves and all that. Me personally? I give it a second thought.
Email is fair game, I have no issues with that. I'm willing to say I'm in Washington state. Even willing to say I'm within a 40-minute drive of Seattle on a good traffic day (and especially willing to say I hate going there. Seattle sucks.)
So now I can add another piece of information to my throwing about of "RL" contact information: my phone number. Go ahead, call me. My phone actually has great spam-filters, too.
I have been using "Grand Central" for quite some time now. It's been in beta for a year or more and I was actually thrilled when they sent an email to everyone saying Google bought them.
It was first invented because of the way cell phone carriers locked you into a phone number. Of course that is no longer the case as all phone numbers are required to be "portable" by law in the United States anyway - but the service is still a 'must-have', indispensable tool and it's free (so far).
Grand Central gives you a local phone number. This is the number I throw around. When you call, it forwards the ring to every phone I choose to set-up. Cell, home, office, best friend, worst enemy, anything. They all ring simultaneously and it even forwards caller ID - I just pick-up the closest ringing phone. I get a message that (your name) is calling, press any button to pick-up.
Or I can allow or send you to voicemail and listen as you leave your message and pick-up at any time. There are a lot of other features with it that I won't bore you with here, like custom greeting messages and rings based on your location or phone number and so on. Suffice it to say it is now (and has been) my permanent number. If I change my "real" numbers, I just reconfigure my GC account to point to them. You will never have to change your phone book again.
I am a heavy Google user. This blog is hosted on Google Blogger, I use Gmail, in fact I use a lot of Google services. Not because I have to, but rather because it's convenient - one login name and password and pop! There it all is. And Google is PC and Mac-friendly. Yes, Google gives the Macintosh more love than Microsoft ever will.
This morning, I got the following in email:
"Hello GrandCentral User,
We are happy to announce that GrandCentral has been upgraded and is relaunching as Google Voice. While not yet open to the public, we wanted to give you, our GrandCentral users, the first opportunity to start using Google Voice.
In addition to the GrandCentral features you already know, we've added voicemail transcription, SMS support, conference calling, Goog411, enhanced spam protection and low-priced international calling. We have also integrated GrandCentral with your Google Account and your Google Contacts list.
To upgrade your account to Google Voice, just log in to your GrandCentral account and follow the directions at the top of your inbox. Upon upgrading, your GrandCentral number, PIN, and forwarding phones will be moved to Google Voice.
Note that since Google Voice uses the Google address book, your GrandCentral contacts will not be imported automatically. You can import your GrandCentral address book with these instructions. You will also need to recreate any individual/group settings and greetings.
After you upgrade, all your new voicemails will be accessible at Google Voice, while all prior messages will remain available at GrandCentral.
Thanks for being a great GrandCentral user and we hope you enjoy Google Voice!
Best,
Craig, Vincent, and the Google Voice team"
Sweet! (again)
Now Grand Central folds into my existing Google login and sits side-by-side with all the other services I love. Google is like my whole office - in the cloud.
[Checkout the screenshot above: my "welcome" voicemail is transcribed into text. How can you not love this?]
And they even gave me a free Dollar so I can try-out the "low cost" international service. I do know people in Europe and even way the hell off in Eastern Europe. But my Rusty is pretty Russkie.
I won't publicly list my "throw-around" number here. But if you ask, I'll have no reservation about giving it. :)
Of course, you could always try the number I gave above and see where it goes...
123-555-1212.
I really have no idea. Tell me if you choose to try it.
Thanks Google!
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Socially Awesome
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