Free Services for Mobile Phone Mavens
October 16th, 2007 (4:00pm) Samuel Dean 9 Comments
Do you tend to concentrate on downloading new applications when you want to expand what you can do with your mobile phone? That’s the norm, but there are actually a lot of calling- and messaging-based ways to immediately start getting more out of your phone. In this post, I’ll compile six very useful tools that won’t cost you anything to start using.
Pinger.com. Pinger.com is a great way to send text-based messages and e-mail attachments to a group with just one voice message. You can save groups—such as the small group of web workers you are in regular contact with—and then tell the whole group the same text-based thing with a phone call. When you sign up for the free service, you get a web inbox so that you can see your responses.
YouMail.com. YouMail.com is especially good if you’re a true cell phone junkie, because you can break free of the voice mail system your service provider offers and completely customize the greetings and options that you offer the various people who call you. It’s free, and you can also get your voice mails online.
Call2.com. If you place a lot of expensive calls to foreign countries, try Call2.com. This service lets you specify what number you’re calling from, what number you want to call, and then it calls you with the connection, at rates that are a fraction of what the big carriers will charge you. You pay Call2.com through a prepaid account that they debit, so there is no bill.
Free Information. Try dialing 1-800-GOOG-411 for Google’s excellent free, speech recognition-based information service. You can find businesses, be automatically connected to them free of charge, and get your results back as text messages. Also try TellMe’s service which does similar things.
Dodgeball.com, Twitter.com, Etc. Dodgeball.com, Twitter.com and other mobile social networking services are used in tons of ways, but I find them especially good for sending broadcast messages to groups about where I currently am.
4Info.net. At 4Info.net you can do the same kinds of mobile searches that you can do on other free services (type “wifi 97354” into your phone to find a Wi-Fi hotspot, etc.), but the site is particularly good for ferreting out low prices on products you may want to buy. Type in “price Xbox 360” for example, to get price comparisons that can save you money.
Do you have any good tips on free services for mobile phones?
9 Comments Post your own comment
Mrinal says: October 17th, 2007 1:04am
gtalk and Viigo (RSS Feeds). gtalk combines with Twitter (and Yahoo/MSN IM) + twitter and Viigo syncs with your OPML file
vince says: October 17th, 2007 1:18am
check what the mobile future will be :) free mobile (wap) social networking AND its live :)
GRC says: October 17th, 2007 7:15am
I’;ve found jott.com to be very useful. Similar to pinger.com, but gives you the option to deliver the message as transcribed text. I’m always sending jott messages to myself and they end up in my e-mail as a text based message that is easy to deal with and move into the appropriate PIM app.
Jordan says: October 19th, 2007 11:38pm
What about Mosio.com? Ask a question via text and get an answer back quickly! All volunteers staff the “answer” line. I’ve used it a few times, and these people are great!
The Law of Mobility » Blog Archive » Converged Products: Week of 10/21/07 says: October 22nd, 2007 2:41am
[...] Web Worker Daily identifies free services for your [...]
mobile phone service » Free Services for <b>Mobile Phone</b> Mavens says: October 22nd, 2007 7:58am
[...] came across this post - Free Services for <b>Mobile Phone</b> Mavens - and thought it was worth sharing. I hope you find it interesting too and take the time to read [...]
Web Worker Daily » Archive Pinger Delivers Free, Visual Voicemail–a Time-Saver « says: February 6th, 2008 4:00pm
[...] If you like Pinger, also definitely look into Jott, a useful free service that lets you record a voicemail message, then transcribes it via speech recognition, and send it either as a text message or an e-mail. You can also choose to have it sent to a number of online sources, including Remember the Milk, Twitter, Vitalist, WordPress, Blogger, Google Calendar, Jaiku, Vitalist, and more. Using your voice while on the go to add reminders to, say, Google Calendar can be very useful. Also see my previous post on free phone-based applications. [...]
The Toolbox : 100+Plus In-Depth Resource Collections for Web Workers « Webessentials’s Weblog says: February 26th, 2008 5:42am
[...] Eight Free Services for Mobile Phone Mavens: Make use of these services to save money and be more productive with your phone. [...]
Behappy75 says: April 23rd, 2008 9:48am
slydial is a must have for anyone who talks on the phone! I ran across this blog about it! slydial connects you directly to someone’s mobile voicemail and seems to work with all carriers. I tried it about a half a dozen times and it worked each time for me.
The service is free. All you do is dial 267-SLYDIAL or 267-759-3425 and then enter the mobile phone number. You listen to a short ad and then it connects you to their voicemail. I guess the ad support pays for the service. Which is fine by me. Free is good!