MONTREAL – A small Canadian company has Facebook users talking. Literally.
babyTel, a Montreal-based VoIP service provider with grown up ambitions, has developed an integrated phone service called ‘Telephone’ for Facebook, allowing its 300 million users the ability to speak live or send voice messages to friends via their Facebook pages.
“Social media developed with photos, emails and IM (instant messaging), and we think that the original way to communicate, that being voice, is going to be integral”, babyTEL’s CEO Steve Dorsey told Cartt.ca during an interview. “Voice adds a warmer communication option conveying meaning beyond mere words.”
The application uses an ‘eggphone’ a Web-based Java softphone that can be downloaded for free to any Windows, Apple or Linux computer. It automatically loads users’ contacts in the directory where they can be sorted in to groups. Telephone lets contacts be called, voice messaged or IM’d with a few clicks, all without leaving the Facebook environment. It also provides IM that can connect users to sites like Yahoo, MSN, AIM and Google Talk.
To make it even more interesting, users can change the decorative skin of their eggphone to reflect their personality or mood by using ‘emoti-skins’ (similar to emoticons). These skins can also be sent between talking parties to express reactions to a conversation as it progresses.
While the basic service is free, users who would like to extend the functionality of their eggphone to either make or receive calls to or from the public network, or forward their calls to their cell phone, can subscribe to ‘Telephoneplus’ for $4.95 per month.
babyTel says they have “tens of thousands” of Telephone customers now, but expect to have “millions and millions of users” by the end of the year as the application catches on.
“That’s our goal, and how we build up a customer base”, Dorsey continued. “
Dorsey said that babyTel has recently begun pitching other companies whose services could be enhanced by the Telephone application, such as dating websites and some video game manufacturers.
Catch Telephone’s on-line overview by clicking here.
