If you thought adding Google Voice to Gmail was a good move for Google, consider yourself on the money. The search engine giant has announced that in the 24 hours since they integrated Google Voice into Gmail to serve as a web-based phone call service, over 1 million calls have been made. That works out to more than 694 calls being made every minute, or almost 12 calls every second!
Google announced yesterday that Google Voice would become an integral part of the Gmail experience going forward. Since making that announcement, it seems that Gmail users have flocked to the new feature, giving the gVoice service a thorough lashing.
The integration of the service into the web-based email client basically allows users to make free VoIP phone calls from their desktop or laptop computers to any phone number in the US or Canada for free. International calls would be charged at the going Google Voice international rates. The premise of Google Voice is to manage all your different phone numbers by linking them to your Google Voice number.
Whenever someone calls your GV number, it rings all the phone lines connected to the account. With gVoice integrated into Gmail, your desktop or laptop essentially becomes an additional phone line.
You’ll have to have a gVoice account in order to take advantage of the new feature, but signing up is as easy as going to google.com/voice. After that, you should see option to “Call Phone” in the contacts sidebar of your Gmail window. Add your Gmail account to Google Voice, if you’d like to have incoming phone calls ring your inbox in addition to all your other phone lines.
[Via: Twitter]