New! Make Calls from Google GMail! Call/Vid'Chat anywhere in the US/Canada for Free thru 2010! Low rates for Intl Calls!

Cin' · 08-25-2010, 07:47 PM

Hey!

I wasn't sure where to put this...so I put it here in OffTopic...

New! Make phone calls from Google Gmail!
Free calls to the U.S. and Canada in 2010!
Also with Insanely low rates for international calls!

Call anywhere in the US and Canada for free and get low rates for other countries with this small plugin — right from within Gmail.

VideoChat also (Just Install a PlugIn & Chat for Free)!

Via Gmail Blog

Quote:

Gmail voice and video chat makes it easy to stay in touch with friends and family using your computer’s microphone and speakers. But until now, this required both people to be at their computers, signed into Gmail at the same time. Given that most of us don’t spend all day in front of our computers, we thought, “wouldn’t it be nice if you could call people directly on their phones?”

Starting today, you can call any phone right from Gmail.

Calls to the U.S. and Canada will be free for at least the rest of the year and calls to other countries will be billed at our very low rates. We worked hard to make these rates really cheap (see comparison table) with calls to the U.K., France, Germany, China, Japan—and many more countries—for as little as $0.02 per minute.

Dialing a phone number works just like a normal phone. Just click “Call phone” at the top of your chat list and dial a number or enter a contact’s name.

We’ve been testing this feature internally and have found it to be useful in a lot of situations, ranging from making a quick call to a restaurant to placing a call when you’re in an area with bad reception.

If you have a Google Voice phone number, calls made from Gmail will display this number as the outbound caller ID. And if you decide to, you can receive calls made to this number right inside Gmail (see instructions).

We’re rolling out this feature to U.S. based Gmail users over the next few days, so you’ll be ready to get started once “Call Phones” shows up in your chat list (you will need to install the voice and video plug-in if you haven’t already). If you’re using Google Apps for your school or business, then you won’t see it quite yet. We’re working on making this available more broadly - so stay tuned!

For more information, visit gmail.com/call.

Via Techcrunch:
Google Voice Integrated Into Gmail. Make And Receive Calls From The Browser

Quote:

We were excited when we got our hands on an unlaunched version of Google Voice for the desktop, which let users make and receive calls via a soft phone on their computer. We hear that software is still on ice, though, and won’t be launched any time soon. But it probably doesn’t matter – today Google Voice is being integrated right into the browser via Gmail. It’s amazingly good – I know because I’ve been testing it for the last few days.

Just download the Google Talk plugin for your browser and you can then make calls to any U.S. or Canadian phone number directly from Gmail. And if you already use Google Voice you can make those calls anywhere else, too, for a very low per minute charge. The feature is fully integrated into Google Voice, which means you can set Google Voice to receive calls in Gmail, and use your Google Voice contact book. Dialing a phone number works just like a normal phone. Just click “Call phone” at the top of your chat list and dial a number or enter a contact’s name.

This is great news if you’ve got bad cell reception in your home or workplace, because you can make and receive calls anywhere you have Wifi reception. Some other very cool features: if you’re on Google Voice and take a call from within Gmail, you switch a call over to your mobile phone and continue it on the go without having to drop the call and reconnect.

Call quality is very, very good – comparable to Skype. See video below of test calls we performed. (Play fullscreen for best viewing, and make sure to check out the screenshots below).

Pricing:

Quote:

Calls to US and Canada for free at least through the end of the year. Google PM Real Time Communications Craig Walker says they hope to keep these calls free indefinitely, provided the margins on international calls can cover the free US/Canada calls.
2 cents/minute landline rates to dozens of countries, with no connection fee on calls.
Mobile rates are often less expensive than competitors

.

Google "Make & Receive" Support if anyone needs it.

Install Voice and Video Chat Link

What will this do to Skype now??

hmm.

Cin...

Ramzii · 08-25-2010, 08:00 PM

yay, potential voice recording! Now google can track us via satellite, monitor our every search on google, follow the results, save them or 'lose' them. Google can have a look inside your childrens personal life via youtube, scan your every email and react to it accordingly, and in the near future all of these semi-services will be your best friend which you will never part with; inside your pocket android.

[/paranoia]

Step666 · 08-25-2010, 08:03 PM

Maybe I'm not fully understanding this but Skype offers free worldwide calling if you're using an internet connection, Google doesn't seem to be offering anything like that, just chargeable calls (for the ~95% of the planet) to landlines or mobiles.

booboo12 · 08-25-2010, 08:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Step666

Maybe I'm not fully understanding this but Skype offers free worldwide calling if you're using an internet connection, Google doesn't seem to be offering anything like that, just chargeable calls (for the ~95% of the planet) to landlines or mobiles.

If your using skype for skype to skype calling then it's free, otherwise you have to use SkypeOut minutes.

Google is making calling free to landlines and cell phones here in the US and Canada. That's a big deal as you won't have to persuade tech phobic family and friends to try skype.

Step666 · 08-25-2010, 08:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by booboo12

If your using skype for skype to skype calling then it's free, otherwise you have to use SkypeOut minutes.

Yeah, that's what I meant - free Skype-to-Skype.
And I'm aware you have to use minutes/pay to call a real phone.

Quote:

Originally Posted by booboo12

Google is making calling free to landlines and cell phones here in the US and Canada. That's a big deal as you won't have to persuade tech phobic family and friends to try skype.

Ok, that's great and all but, I repeat, for the other 95% of the world it's really not something we can get worked up about - especially since Google freely admit they're going to use the profits made off of the likes of ourselves to allow you lot to make your free calls.

And whilst I appreciate your point about it being easier than getting friends/family to adopt a new technology, the only people I would want to use this system to contact are people in other countries that are also G-Mail users - if I need to call a number in the UK, I have free minutes on my mobile and free calls on my landline.
It just seems like a pretty big mistake/poor idea to not allow free worldwide G-Mail-to-G-Mail calls.

Angelic · 08-25-2010, 08:40 PM

Is there any reason to use this when everyone is using Skype?

Cin' · 08-25-2010, 08:43 PM

Uh...Not everyone uses Skype lol. It comes down to personal choice on what service you want to use.

I just tried it out with a convo' with friend & family member, worked well.

Cin...

booboo12 · 08-25-2010, 08:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Step666

Ok, that's great and all but, I repeat, for the other 95% of the world it's really not something we can get worked up about - especially since Google freely admit they're going to use the profits made off of the likes of ourselves to allow you lot to make your free calls.

And whilst I appreciate your point about it being easier than getting friends/family to adopt a new technology, the only people I would want to use this system to contact are people in other countries that are also G-Mail users - if I need to call a number in the UK, I have free minutes on my mobile and free calls on my landline.
It just seems like a pretty big mistake/poor idea to not allow free worldwide G-Mail-to-G-Mail calls.

Yeah, here mobile doesn't necessarily work that way unless you get an unlimited plan, (or are on sprint with "any mobile any time") otherwise you're using a finite number of minutes to call both landlines and cell phones (those phones that aren't on your own carrier of course.)

I'm sure that this is a staged rollout to ensure that the darn thing actually works under load. They'll expand it soon enough.

EricaL · 08-25-2010, 09:01 PM

this is amazing. i called a few friends in the u.s.a today.

and i don't use skype.

H.A.L. 9000 · 08-25-2010, 09:05 PM

I've been using this going back about a year (Google Voice)... it's nice when I'm in the mountains with no cell signal, but with local WiFi, I can fire up Google Voice from my android phone and make a call no problem. I even have all my voicemail's forwarded to GV. It transcribes the VM's and sends a transcript to me in my email inbox. Quite the handy service if you ask me!