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Google Voice Users May Want to Avoid Windows Phone

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Google’s war against Microsoft has taken another hostage in the form of Google Voice users. After a battle that resulted in the removal of a more advanced YouTube application for Microsoft’s mobile OS platform, Windows Phone users could kiss goodbye to third-party Google Voice apps next year as a result of Google enforcing its new terms-of-service.

This could spell the end of Google Voice via an app for Windows Phone users by May 15, 2014. Users on Windows Phone could still access Google Voice over the mobile web by pointing their smartphone browsers to the mobile site for Google Voice, though this method isn’t preferred and is far more clunky than a dedicated app.

Google-Voice

“Finally, we want to make Google Voice as secure as possible,” Google’s Nikhyl Singhal wrote on Google+. ” There are a few third-party applications that provide calling and SMS services by making unauthorized use of Google Voice. These apps violate our Terms of Service and pose a threat to your security, so we’re notifying these app developers that they must stop making unauthorized use of Google Voice to run their services and transition users by May 15, 2014.”

As Google doesn’t make an official Google Voice app or many other apps for Windows Phone, this will have a huge impact on Google Voice users who rely on the service as it may make Windows Phone a less viable platform to adopt if you rely on Google’s telephony service.

Google Voice is a service that provides users with a single number that you can give out to friends and family. That single number can be programmed to ring any or all of your phones so you can pick up whichever phone is more convenient–whether that’s your cell, landline, or office phone. It also masks your real phone number if you don’t want to give that out.

In addition to ending Google Voice support and feuding with Microsoft over YouTube for Windows Phone, Google is also dropping Exchange ActiveSync. News of Google restricting Google Voice comes just after Google is enhancing its Hangouts messaging app with integrated SMS, MMS, and Google Voice support on rival iOS and Android platforms, though Google Voice won’t be integrated into the Android app until a later date.

7 Comments

7 Comments

  1. Bigmouth

    11/05/2013 at 10:40 am

    This is the kind of behavior that attracts antitrust scrutiny.

  2. charles

    11/05/2013 at 11:10 am

    Google is lame. Skype rocks! 2 billion minutes a day on record.

  3. Aron Tripp

    11/05/2013 at 1:00 pm

    Should just change the title of this article to “Users May Want to Avoid Windows Phone”. I still don’t understand why people get ssoooo upset when Google doesn’t offer their products to WP. If you want Google products, get an Android phone. I don’t whine because I can’t get FaceTime on Android. If I want FaceTime, I’ll get an iProduct.

    • AMR1

      11/05/2013 at 4:04 pm

      The title could just as easily have been “Users May Want to Avoid Google”, as they are the ones who are causing the problems here. I am surprised that Google is so fearful of WP, that they are having to block WP access to their apps. Google allows access to iOS devices, but not to WP. Perhaps they fear that the wave in Europe that has already placed WP ahead of iPhone in several countries, and with trends headed there in others will be coming to the US, but I doubt that WP will unseat Android in the US.

    • William

      11/06/2013 at 4:16 am

      Google not offering their products for Windows Phone and Windows 8 is not the problem. The problem is that Google is blocking access to their services for 3rd party-apps on Windows (Phone). For no apparent reason, just claiming that it’s about security or violating ToS.

      Extremely childish and exposing Google’s fear that Windows and Windows Phone will develop to be a threat.

      • Dan H.

        11/06/2013 at 11:40 am

        Yep, you nailed it. I’m getting to dislike Google more and more. Skype is awesome anyway.
        I’m weening myself off their services and I do not develop anything that relies on their APIs. Third party developers make their APIs useful and gets them popular and then Google cuts em off at the knees when they get popular

  4. Gueneal

    07/13/2014 at 7:41 pm

    Bah Okay so before I say this I’m totally devil’s advocate here. This smacks of the same thinking as the patent wars a few years ago, personally if I were Microsoft I would “leak” a memo that stated we were going to plan to drop support for ALL Google products with the upcoming release if they didn’t start playing nice with our products… but once again devil’s advocate.

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