
Google to reportedly kill Voice, integrate it into Hangouts - zosegal
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2109265/google-to-reportedly-kill-voice-integrate-it-into-hangouts.html
======
kristopolous
Why is google willfully sabotaging every great product they have all in the
name of one terrible one that nobody wants?

Up until about 2010 or so, they were absolutely legendary for their skillful
execution of ideas - just the right interface, feature-set, and balance. Time
and time again, everything they did they knocked out of the park.

And then, something changed.

Now they are changing what they did right by taking the dumbest moves over and
over again - the ones that completely destroys their credibility and alienates
their userbase.

Is there a single user anywhere who wants this? I really don't get it.

If google did a survey:

"Are you happy with google voice or would you rather have it in our wacky
skype knockoff that you use with our goofy facebook clone?"

I'm trying to think of what it would look like if other companies decided to
do a similar thing. It would be like if say, General Mills came out with a
terrible wretched artificial sweetener and then decide to put it in every
product they sell because well, it's their sweetener - of course they should
completely dismantle all of their successful lines in the name of their
incredibly unsuccessful one. Duh!

I really hope that they find the John-Scully's who are internally making all
these retarded decisions and stop doing what they say - or else they're well
on their way to being a has-been. Yet another great company that somehow put a
bunch of ivy-league fortune-500 trainwreck-types in charge and then trusted
them until it was too late.

In 1999 my friend called Google The next altavista. At this rate, he may be
right.

~~~
fidlefodl
I like it, but then i generally like the products as a whole.

\- I've been using Voice for ages, with little to no improvement. This will
bring lots of improvement, instead of me worrying about Voice like it's the
next Reader. \- I've also been using Plus for ages, so i don't have a fear it
either.

I understand this Plus requirement is annoying to some, but i honestly don't
get the resentment.

To me, Plus is google doing what they should have done with Wave. Made a
product, and invested in it. As a company, integrating your products is not a
bad thing, it's a good thing, imo. I'm sure many will scream "But not when
your users hate your other product!" and.. well.. tough shit heh.

If it ends up being a terrible move then they'll pay for it and die out. But i
don't think it's a wrong move for them to try.

As it is, Voice is a wasteland, and it actually getting some love and
attention will be awesome. I'm looking forward to it.

------
chimeracoder
Well, this kind of sucks.

I use a Google Voice number that is associated with a Gmail account that I do
not use for any other purpose (Hangouts/Talk or otherwise). It doesn't even
have a Google+ account associated with it.

It's nice to have single number that can ring all my lines.

If/when this is killed, what's the alternative?

(Article appears to be down/inaccessible for me).

~~~
stanleydrew
Read the article. They are not killing Google Voice. They are rolling it into
Hangouts.

~~~
gknoy
... which will then require you to log in with a Google Plus-upgraded account.
I have two Gmail accounts, and can't use the hangouts feature on one of them
(in the browser or through their client) without enabling Plus.

~~~
zmanian
Google's login system is horribly broken. They seem to have to reinvent a
method for handling the multi account scenario in every product.

The resistance to adding G+ to accounts seems Sisphyean. Larry Page clearly
envisions a common integrate identity systems across the product tree and I
don't think anyone is going to stop him.

~~~
ithkuil
A common identity system across the product tree is not a bad thing actually.
If it were there from the beginning nobody would complain about this whole
thing now.

The problem is that they wanted to brand this move as "hey g+ify your
account".

It probably has something to do with the change in terms and conditions. I
guess they could have forced everybody to this new terms and conditions (or
leave) but instead they let people choose to use google products with the old
terms and conditions by letting users to actively opt in to g+ (ehm, some
might say "tricked", but that's another story).

What I wanted to say is that usually people look at this whole thing as an
evil move, but hey all the companies around amend their terms and conditions
and usually don't let you a choice about whether you want to be part of a new
incarnation of the service, or not yet.

Note: I'm not talking in favour or against the actual terms and conditions
(e.g. the real name policy), this is an orthogonal issue. I have the feeling
that in the end it all boils down to this.

Anyway, this is so confusing. The fact that we are still talking about all
this crap means that the was a failure in communication.

I wish there was a way to switch to this new identity system, and then disable
G+ for your account. This would make so many people happy and probably it
won't reduce the number of new G+ users by much.

------
stanleydrew
For people like me who follow this space closely, this is not news. And to be
fair, the article doesn't really claim it as news.

The Google Voice team was rolled into the Hangouts team long ago. The only
thing they haven't done is roll the Google Voice app's functionality into the
Hangouts app.

~~~
toomuchtodo
I don't understand why you'd roll all of your products into something that has
a terrible user experience. I'm a long-time Google/Android user, and its just
painful using Hangouts. I disabled it and switched to Telegram.

~~~
majika
A number of security professionals have expressed serious concern about
Telegram, including Moxie Marlinspike [0] [1] and Geoffroy Couprie [2].

It's really painful to see Telegram gaining popularity, when it has such
glaring errors.

You should instead use OTR on Jabber (ChatSecure [3]), or TextSecure [4]
(which now has an Internet delivery mechanism).

[0]: [http://thoughtcrime.org/blog/telegram-crypto-
challenge/](http://thoughtcrime.org/blog/telegram-crypto-challenge/)

[1]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6936539](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6936539)

[2]: [http://unhandledexpression.com/2013/12/17/telegram-stand-
bac...](http://unhandledexpression.com/2013/12/17/telegram-stand-back-we-know-
maths/)

[3]: [https://chatsecure.org/](https://chatsecure.org/)

[4]:
[https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.thoughtcri...](https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.thoughtcrime.securesms&hl=en)

~~~
pessimizer
Those criticisms aren't about Telegram's UI as compared to Hangouts, though.
At a minimum, your communication through Telegram is as secure as your
communication through a google property.

------
cdjk
The most useful feature of Google Voice to me is the voicemail transcription.
It's not perfect, but it's good enough it saves me from having to listen to
the voicemail about 90% of the time.

There are plenty of other voip/call forwarding services, but are there any
that duplicate that functionality?

~~~
hanley
This is all that I use Google Voice for. I love having a transcribed voicemail
emailed to me, _for free_. Are there any other options out there? I've noticed
lately that the Google Voice app sucks - the UI is unintuitive and is
painfully slow to refresh my messages. I'd be happy to switch if there is an
alternative.

------
zippergz
I assume existing Voice numbers will at least continue working/forwarding?
That's my main concern. I have a few different Google Voice numbers I use for
different purposes, and my wife actually uses one as her primary number
(against my recommendation). I've kind of expected something "bad" to happen
to Voice for a while, but as long as the forwarding continues to work this
isn't the end of the world for me.

------
untog
For some reason the site isn't loading for me. If they want to integrate the
features of Voice into Hangouts then that's great. The Voice app has been
utterly neglected for years.

If they want to kill all the Voice features, then I'll be very disappointed.

~~~
JoeAnzalone
Do you have HTTPS Everywhere installed? I had to disabled it for pcworld.com
before the article would load.

------
lingben
this move would be a prelude to the cancellation of voice (after it flounders
in its new forced home):

[http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns](http://www.gwern.net/Google%20shutdowns)

(note google voice is the highest cancellation risk predicted)

~~~
w1ntermute
Voice isn't being "cancelled," its features are just being integrated into the
service it should have been in to start with.

------
mdr25
Ugh, I hate that SMS is conflated with Hangouts as it is. It causes
notifications for work-related chat to get mixed in with notifications for
personal text messages on my phone. Can anyone suggest alternative SMS clients
for Android?

~~~
berberous
TextSecure! Nobody I know uses it, so the encryption/privacy features are
basically useless, but it's a fast, well-designed, pretty app regardless. It
also has a feature I love: persistent notifications for unread texts.

~~~
tbh
Seconding this, switched to TextSecure when they combined SMS and Hangouts. It
is an excellent SMS app replacement. The crypto doesn't get in your way, even
when almost none of your contacts also use it.

------
Pxtl
While all of this consolidation of their myriad overlapping services and
products into a small suite of core services that offer strong featuresets
makes sense, I'm constantly astonished how _bad_ they've done at it.
Bombarding users with annoying questions about Plus (and the questions are
annoying regardless of your opinions on Plus - they never should've even tried
to make Plus optional, just enable it but keep it out of the freaking way) and
screwing up these transitions... does anybody _like_ any of these new Google
apps? And these new apps are increasingly awful or nonexistent outside of
Android/Chrome. Can you even send a message through hangouts without
installing the browser plug-in? Do they even have a browser-version of
Currents?

------
baldfat
The issues for a LONG TIME Voice user:

1) Voice Mailbox - What Now?

2) My mobile phone number IS my Google Voice Number (Sprint)

3) Ring at multiple locations (Isn't valuable to me anymore)

4) The google.com/voice web page is a lifesaver for searching through my text,
and voice mail. (Most Needed Function) _____

~~~
stanleydrew
I am also a long-time Google Voice user. It's been my primary number for about
5 years now.

The issues you raise are all irrelevant, except for #4. They are not killing
off Google Voice phone numbers or functionality. They are just rolling it into
Hangouts.

I don't know what they are planning to do with their google.com/voice web
property though.

------
morsch
They also removed the last bit of Jabber interoperability in the new Google
Mail chat/hangouts frontend.

I used to be able to talk to my Jabber frieds on both Android and Gmail/Web.
They dropped federation on Android with the move to Hangouts, and --
unsurprisingly -- they're now doing the same for Gmail/Web as it's moving to
Hangouts.

I'm eyeing TextSecure as a replacement IM tool. Sort of hoping the TextSecure
desktop app comes around before the Gmail Hangout integration becomes
mandatory; but as cool as TextSecure may be from a security perspective, they
haven't exactly blown me away with the timeliness of their releases. ;)

~~~
saraid216
> they're now doing the same for Gmail/Web as it's moving to Hangouts.

Moving? Hasn't this been the case for the last two years?

~~~
morsch
I'm referring to this: [http://gmailblog.blogspot.de/2013/05/try-out-new-
hangouts-ex...](http://gmailblog.blogspot.de/2013/05/try-out-new-hangouts-
experience-in-gmail.html)

It's still opt-in, at least for me.

~~~
saraid216
Huh. Yeah, it just showed up for me one day and I continued ignoring it.

------
new_guy123
As more and more of these get GPlused, the more repuslive they are become.
Among all the IM apps out there, I think hangouts sucks the most. More than
the fb messenger. 2-3 years back, a lot of people I knew were using gtalk.
Infact that was the default IM. We use watsapp now, or fb in case we don't
have a number, but not hangouts. This massive transition clearly happened
during the gtalk to hangouts change and I don't think I will go back unless
the experience becomes better.

~~~
wrexsoule
gtalk is still the default IM in pretty much everyone I know from different
social circles. Even fb messenger during work hours I tend to see pretty much
everyone in gtalk while fb is very sparse. And don't get me started on
whatsapp, I don't know a single person who uses that, and nobody seems to even
be aware what it is when I ask around. I guess they all have different use
cases. I for one have been and will stay with gtalk.

------
ape4
Hey Google I don't want everything in Google+

~~~
headShrinker
Your comment reminds me of recent article on HN, which I can't find at the
moment. The jest of the entry was that G+ isn't for the customer, it's for
google to organize its data on you. Here is another article by The Guardian
that touches on a similar sentiment.
[http://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2013/jun/04/googl...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2013/jun/04/google-
plus-the-matrix)

------
rdpfeffer
Hey All, definitely check out SendHub as a Business Replacement for google
voice. It has all of the same features (and plenty GV doesn't). In my opinion
SendHub also has better apps and a way better web interface.

Also, I'm a Co-Founder here at SendHub. So if you have any questions on
getting this to work please drop us a line. (ryan@sendhub.com)

~~~
jdbernard
How do minutes and texts work when all of it redirecting to another number? In
other words, I already pay for unlimited text and several hundred minutes as
part of my mobile phone plan. The vast majority of my communications are
forwarded to that phone. Would I have to pay SendHub again for those minutes
and messages if they were routed through SendHub?

------
hhsnopek
I saw this coming once Hangouts gained SMS compatibility. The nice thing is, I
won't have 2 separate apps to view all my messages. I'll be able to make calls
and text via Voice(within hangouts) for work, receive normal texts and calls
in hangouts, and still be able to chat up with my circles!

------
coreymgilmore
This isn't necessarily new news (they spoke of it last year, albeit once), but
this is gaining some steam again.

I personally, would like to see some integration. But sometimes, Google just
tries to G+-ify everything a bit too much. Ex: Latitude and YouYube comments.

Hopefully this will just be a nice seamless transition of the GV sms messaging
into Hangouts. I could see that as useful.

------
aestra
I just really hate the concept of them somewhat "making" you have a G+
account. Good for a business perspective I guess, but limits consumers. I have
no desire to create a G+ account and I'm somewhat annoyed that it seems to be
somewhat mandatory for more and more of Google's' Services.

------
Jonovono
Anyone know of alternatives?

I bought a jailbroken iPhone and have been just using a iPad sim card in it
for the last little while. This way I pay about $10/month for enough data to
get talk / text and the ability to surf the net a lot cheaper!

Edit: Or maybe I will still be able to do this once it is integrated with +.

~~~
stanleydrew
Which AT&T plan are you using? I'm about to write up an article about going
data-only and could use some more reference plans besides T-Mobile's.

~~~
Jonovono
I am actually in Canada, so I use Bell (This is the plan:
[http://www.bell.ca/Mobility/Cell_phone_plans/iPad_data_plans...](http://www.bell.ca/Mobility/Cell_phone_plans/iPad_data_plans/Flex_plan.tab)).
I guess it's actually usually around $20 (sometimes I don't go over the 10MB
plan if I am on Wifi lots). This is the best I could find for something in
Canada.

Let me see that article when you are done! If I move to the US I'll be looking
to try the same thing there.

Edit: I am looking at Bolt. Looks awesome. I hope in a few years phone numbers
just don't exist. (well, abstracted out).

~~~
stanleydrew
Thanks for the link to Bell. We're adding a catalog of data-only plans around
the world and tutorials about how to get them to the Bolt site.

And I agree about phone numbers. They should just be the IP addresses of
communication. But nobody's developed a good-enough DNS equivalent (yet). We
still all rely on a local cache of numbers in our phones' address books.

~~~
Jonovono
Cool! I have also heard of a few other related things:

[http://www.fongo.com/](http://www.fongo.com/) (And I thought there was
another one out of the Waterloo area but can't find it, maybe it was this. )

[http://www.freedompop.com/](http://www.freedompop.com/)

[https://angel.co/signal-mobile](https://angel.co/signal-mobile)

Ya, exactly. When I meet someone. Why not be able to just start typing their
name and add them that way. If they change their number it can be updated
automatically so I have the new one.

------
chris_mahan
I've been using Voice as my primary number since the GrandCentral days. They
better not fuck that up too.

Edit: For those who say "it's free don't complain" I reply: "Then Google
should bill me. I'll pay."

------
jpswade
Voice never came to the UK anyway...

------
jgalt212
How long before you need a G+ account to use Google Search?

------
bwanab
Any idea why Hangouts won't work on Firefox?

------
vernie
Introducing the Google+ Hangouts Car.

------
zoom
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

