Category: Web/Tech

Last November, I wrote about the configuration for voice calls that I’ve been using at my office. That setup involved using a headset on my MacBook Pro along with Skype – with a Skype-In number being used to receive calls I’ve forwarded from my iPhone.

This way, if somebody calls me on my iPhone number (different from my “public” number which is Google Voice-based), it rings through to Skype and I take the call in my headset.

I also have been much preferring doing conference calls etc. using my headset and Skype. In fact, I don’t even have a traditional landline phone in my office – just my iPhone and Skype on my MacBook Pro.

Skype has been setup to show my iPhone number on caller ID – so folks know that it’s me calling – even when using Skype.

Recently Google announced the addition of voice call in Gmail – including an integration with Google Voice for receiving calls to your Google Voice number in your browser. Instead of call forwarding my iPhone to a Skype-In number (that I have to pay an annual fee for), I can now just forward the iPhone to my Google Voice number and have it passed through to Gmail where I can answer it on the same headset I’ve been using. If I don’t answer, Google Voice takes the voice mail, emails me a transcript and sends an SMS to my iPhone.

What’s missing from this setup is an ability to selectively set outbound callerID on Google Voice to my iPhone number. Skype provides that capability – but near as I can tell Google Voice doesn’t. I can understand why they might not want to allow that – and I’m not sure it actually matters. Folks that know me by my “private” iPhone number won’t see it when I call via Google Voice – instead, they’ll see my Google Voice caller ID – which is exactly 1 digit different. If I care about it, I can call them using Skype where I can set my caller ID – assuming I renew my outbound calling subscription. On the other hand, maybe I’d just prefer that everyone (beyond family) just call my Google Voice number anyway – so if they store that one away I’ll be just fine.

Bottom line: seems like I no longer need the Skype In online number. Skype’s fees for that number are something like 50 Euros for 12 months. With Google Voice, I also now don’t need Skype’s unlimited minutes subscription to the US and Canada – which costs about 20 Euros for 12 months but is free (at least until year end) with Google. So, for now, it looks like roughly a 70 Euro savings moving my voice configuration from Skype to Google Voice.

Is there any reason I should be paying Skype anything at this point? The only reason this is interesting is that my Skype annual subscriptions are up in about 10 days!

For many years, I’ve been a desktop mail client kind of guy – Mail.app on the Mac to be clear. It just worked for me, brought me a consolidated inbox (I’ve got about a dozen different email accounts around the globe), and a bunch of filters (Mail.app calls them “Rules”).

Since I migrated both work and personal email to Google Apps for Domains a couple of years ago I’ve been increasingly drawn to doing some email work in the browser. In fact, as Chrome has matured, I’ve basically got it configured with Tabs for my various email accounts. But I never committed to mail in the browser – if you know what I mean. Mail.app was my mail client.

Then, two weeks ago, Google announced the launch of priority inbox – a clever way to cleave the noise in your inboxes to separate the wheat from the chaff. Using some nifty smart algorithms that flip span filtering upside down, Gmail now does a more than decent job of identifying what’s important from what isn’t in my endless email stream. And, if it guesses wrong, I can quickly tell it to adjust – and it remembers. (There’s a weird sense of power clicking on an email from someone it thought was important and lowering them to just regular – and vice versa!). Of course, none of this matters (or works!) unless you’re doing email in the browser.

So, after giving it a trial workout, I’ve now migrated most of my email work into the browser – with Mail.app just running alongside for old time’s sake. I’ve learned most of the shortcut keys in Gmail – and it’s become quite productive – feeling faster and easier than Mail.app.

That’s the latest in my endless email story – how about you?

By the way, here are the settings I’m using for Priority Inbox:

Sometimes things come into our lives that end up having a profound impact – yet we don’t realize it at the time. Google’s announcement today of a new priority inbox feature for Gmail feels like it might just have that characteristic. If this feature works as well as Google’s anti-spam technology works, I suspect I’ll be spending much more time doing email in the browser instead of in Mail.app on my Mac.

In the early days of our partnership, we used Groove as our “groupware” platform. We wanted a peer-to-peer solution – wanting to avoid a server-based approach. As Ray Ozzie described it, Groove was a solution for the post-email world.

And, for us, it was a great – if quirky – one. Groove attracted a small group of passionate users – but failed to attract anything close to a mass market. Groove was ultimately acquired by Microsoft – mostly for Ozzie, not for the product itself.

This afternoon, Google announced that development of Wave was ceasing – having failed to attract enough users to be important enough. The closest thing to Groove in my mind was Wave – and it failed similarly.

There’s a definite market here – that both Microsoft and Google found just to small to matter. That market will matter to someone – we’ll see who picks up the gauntlet – and whether they (and their investors) have the patience for this market to really develop. If there’s competition, it’s Google Docs. But, as the success of Dropbox has shown, Google Docs still leaves a LOT to be desired.

Darwin at work.