Michael Lee Vazquez
My Little View

So I signed up for GrandCentral.com a few years back (at the urging of lifehacker.com) and I pretty much sat on it.  The point of this service is to have “one number to rule them all”.  You can setup all your phone numbers to point to one number which they give you, but I didn’t trust this new service.  Well, maybe I was just too lazy to give out my “new” number.

A few weeks ago my buddy asked if I had any invites to Google Voice.  I was a bit confused about what he was talking about but it was soon explained to me that Google bought GrandCentral.com and dubbed it Google Voice.  Now my confidence shot through the roof and I am ready to give out my new number.

Now, I guess I could just start telling people of my new number but the first hangup became clear.  I can inform everyone of my new number, but they will still be getting calls from my old number.  There is a way to initiate a call online which is kinda nifty.  You log into Google Voice and find the person you want to talk to and hit “call”.  Google Voice will call you, then after you answer, it will dial who you want to talk to and their caller ID will show your new number.

I wanted to somehow get around this.  Beyond hope, I thought maybe Sprint would let me change my cellphone’s caller ID to my new Google Voice number.  That would be the easiest thing to do.  But alas, no dice.

Tonight, I came home excited about Google Voice and tried to explain this all to my wife.  She wasn’t too excited about all this; “But you already have a phone number.”  “Yeah, but this my permanent number!”  “I will know when you get a new number.”  Ugh.  So I was trying to show off some of it’s features.  I finally ended up starting an SMS conversation.

“Who is this 406 number you’re SMS’n from???”  That threw me for a loop, we were totally confused.  I dialed the number and lo and behold, it rung her phone with my new number!  After a few minutes with Google, it turns out that Google Voice does this mapping magic between you and your contact’s numbers.  From the looks of it, it’s a permanent association.  When I call or SMS 406-953-4171, it will connect me with my wife, but with my Google Voice number!

If YOU call that number, I have no clue what it would do.  When one of my registered phones call it, Google Voice knows it’s me and that I’m trying to call my wife.  For now I have a solution.  SMS all my friends and get them to respond back.  Then take the number that shows up and add it to their contact info on their phone.  Use that number to interact with them.

The only thing is, I wish Google Voice would show you these mappings.  I doubt I can get the utility companies to SMS me back (for the caller ID account lookups), let alone some of my non-tech savvy relatives.  And this would only work with cellphones and not land lands.  Keeping track of two numbers will suck too.  But hey, it’s a start.

As of now, my current cellphone number works, but don’t be surprised if you get an SMS from me asking you to respond to it.

And yes, as soon as I get some invites, I will be handing them out.