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Codebreaker

Could Vonage deal signal the end of phone numbers?

John Moe Aug 4, 2010

That’s a bit of an extrapolation but not all that far fetched. Vonage is a VOIP (voice over internet protocol) company and they have a new free app for Android and iPhone. It lets you call any one of your Facebook friends for free over either Wi-Fi or 3G. The friend has to have the app too so you’re restricted to your smart phone friends who have taken this course. There are obviously now way more ways to get in touch with someone than you can actually use. But what I think matters here is the absence of phone number; you just point to their name and they’re called and you never even needed to put in their number originally (or use cell minutes for that matter). Facebook is very good at establishing one unique identity for each person, this Vonage plan uses that identity as a phone number, ditches the number itself.

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