I got an interesting comment from Guillaume to my Yahoo Messenger is not VoIP article that reads:
You're the specialist so correct me if i'm wrong but I will reply here what I replied over there:
"Yahoo Inc's will be limited to PC-to-PC calling to contacts on the messenger buddy list."
Well pardon me if i'm wrong but this sentence IS wrong from what I'm observing
so why is it I can place a Net2Phone call from the Actions drop down menu?...I mean isn't that VoIP?
Link 1 :
http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/messenger/win/beta/voip/voip-03.html
Maybe the rates are far from competiting with Skype (I sincerely dunno I have never used Skype) but it seems to be the same tool:
http://help.yahoo.com/help/us/messenger/win/beta/voip/voip-03.html
Did I miss something here?
I responded back that he had a "nice find". It does appear Yahoo! Messenger does do PC-to-PSTN calling. But shame on Yahoo! for such a confusing press release that did NOT promote the fact that they do support PC-to-PSTN calling via a third-party VoIP service provider - namely Net2Phone.I actually tried to confirm whether or not Yahoo Messenger 7.0 supported PC-to-PSTN calling by going to their web site and checking out their features. EVEN THEN I COULD NOT FIND PC-TO-PSTN calling listed in the feature-set. Inexcusable!
Check out the pages in the order I surfed:
http://messenger.yahoo.com/
I then clicked "See the Features" at the top which brought me here:
http://messenger.yahoo.com/features.php;_ylt=AvqPlnnnZM7pFqaNU1WkHftwMMIF
Yahoo lists "Entertainment, Productivity, Personalization, and Communication" as major option headings. Under Communication, the closest thing to VoIP was "Voice Chat" with a description reading "Talk with others using your speakers and microphone.
So I clicked on "Voice Chat".
And lo and behold, do we see PC-to-PSTN calling listed? Nope! It only talks about PC-to-PC, buddy-to-buddy voice chat.
How can Yahoo screw this up so badly? If they have PC-to-PSTN calling that's major news. Why they didn't properly promote this fact is beyond me.
Even their own press release from yesterday
about the new Yahoo Messenger doesn't list PC-to-PSTN:
Business Wire: Yahoo! Messenger Announces Free, High-Quality Worldwide Calling
Free, Hig-Quality Worldwide calling? Well tickle me pink, Yahoo's got some VoIP game! That's what most people will infer from the title of this press release - only to be disappointed that the release does not mention anything about PC-to-PSTN calling.
Read a snippet here, it says:
"-- Free Worldwide Calling and Voicemail(1): Yahoo! Messenger has enhanced its already popular voice service to allow consumers to far more easily call anywhere in the world for free through high-quality, PC-to-PC calling. Making calls over the Internet gives people more to talk about by being able to connect with friends and family while viewing photos, playing games, searching the Web and so much more. People just need an Internet connection and a headset or a microphone and speakers."
I did later on find that the Yahoo Messener Beta page is different from the main Yahoo Messenger page - but
even the beta page doesn't list PC-to-PSTN calling! Ok, I give up.
To have to find this feature via Yahoo Messenger's Help screen like the comment poster did is beyond
ludicrous!
My only theory on this is that maybe because Yahoo! itself isn't offering the PC-to-PSTN dialing/termination (Net2Phone) is, they didn't promote this fact? After all, Windows/MSN Messenger also has the ability to make PC-to-PSTN calls using third-party VoIP providers and nobody crows about Microsoft having PC-to-PSTN abilities.
Actually, I just checked my MSN Messenger and it looks like Microsoft removed the menu option "Start a Phone Conversation". Huh... Wonder when they did that - I didn't even notice. I guess nobody was using it.
