Austin Lane

If you are anything like me, then you may not always have all the phone numbers you need stored neatly in your phone. For a long time, the solution for this issue has been to dial various non-free information services. The problem that I have with these services is that you are charged to call them, and then you are charged again when they connect you to the phone number you request.

Google is now on the phone information directory scene, and is making progress like it has in the search industry. In fact, they have turned the information service into another search service. The new service is called Google Voice Local Search. According to the website, “Google Voice Local Search is Google’s experimental service to make local-business search accessible over the phone.”

All you need to do is call 1-800-GOOG-411 (1-800-466-4411) and talk to the voice-recognition system. Amazingly enough, it is able to understand those of us from Texas without any issues. You can even have Google send you a SMS message with the phone number you wish to dial in it.

Oh, and what about connecting you to the number you are requesting? It turns out that Google makes that a FREE service as well.

You can find more new and exciting producs Google is working on at Google Labs.

This entry was posted on Monday, August 27th, 2007 at 10:58 am and is filed under Austin Lane, Browsers, Internet, Jeff's Tech Tip. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.