Technology moves at increasing speed these days and as it does so old
monopolies die and new options and alternatives take their place. Take
phone calls for instance. Not that long ago the only way to make a phone
call would be to have a landline. Thus, only a handful of companies
across the world had complete control of the market. However, all this
is changing and now it is possible to make discount phone calls with ease, not just from home via your computer, but also on your smart phone.
The best known of these providers is probably Skype.
Skype offers a range of affordable options ranging from free – if you
call to another Skype account – to a chargeable top-up service that
allows you to make calls direct to landlines and mobiles. Fortunately,
it is possible to install Skype as an app on
your smart phone which means that you’ll be able to chat to your
friends, family and colleagues anywhere for free. Skype also comes with
video calling too, though if you’re using your smart phone you might
find that the data transfer required is too heavy for your bandwidth
thus compromising the quality considerably.
Of course other alternatives are available. Viber, which was launched in direct competition to Skype, is another popular app
that allows you to make discount calls. It is similar to Skype in that
it not only permits calls but also let’s you send pictures, text and
video.
Google have launched their own service, Google Voice, which claims to
‘enhance your phone’. This innovative software builds on the features
found on programs such as Skype and Viber. It includes the ability to
read a transcript of voicemail messages that have been left for you.
Unfortunately, whilst Skype will allow calls to landlines anywhere in
the world, Google’s landline service is still restricted to the United
States, although they promise that the service will be opened out to the
rest of the world in due course.
The most astonishing thing about all these options is that international phone calls, which remain expensive to make by regular land line and mobile service providers, are free
via use of these new programs. They offer similar functionality though
you might want to consider downloading all of them to your smart phone.
This will enable you not only to make direct comparisons, but if one
fails due to a technical issue (still a problem in this burgeoning
field) then you’ll have a back-up to rely on.
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