A GrandCentral By Any Other Name Still Rules

David Pogue’s notes:

Then, in 2007, Google bought GrandCentral. It stopped accepting new members, ceased any visible work on it, and, apparently, forgot about it completely…

As it turns out, the joke was on them. Google was quietly working on GrandCentral all along. Starting Thursday, existing GrandCentral members can upgrade to Google Voice. In a few weeks, after debugging the system, Google will open the service to all.

Google Voice starts with a clean, redesigned Web site that looks like an in-box, à la Gmail. It maintains all of those original GrandCentral features — but more important, introduces four game-changing new ones.

When we launched the RRR website in 2006 we also got ourselves a virtual phone number from GrandCentral, which has turned out to be one of the most prescient moves of all. Our team is now spread out across the country, and customers have no idea that when they call our “office line” they could theoretically reach a home office in Cambridge, a library in Palo Alto, or a café in Brooklyn.

I’m stoked for automatic voicemail transcription.  Baby steps toward my inbox fantasy.

Source: The New York Times

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