Free/Cheap Ways to Stay in Touch

[Peterson 0]

After a few months of cell phone sticker shock, I've found the following cheap/free ways to stay in touch with my girl. I thought I'd post them here in case some of you might find them useful.

Futurephone. I have no idea how long this will last or what the marketing scheme is behind it, but it does work. Free international calls. You just call the number, press 1, then enter your fiance's cell phone number, making sure to include the country code. If you don't believe me, believe the NYTimes:

http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2006/10/09/09pogues-posts-4/

SMS Widget. This is a Mac app, but you can use it on PCs and via the web as well. It give you free texting within the US and Canada, and cheap texts worldwide (e.g., I can text Thailand for 6 cents instead of my cell phone co's 10 cents), plus I can compose them on a real keyboard and still get her responses on my phone.

http://keakaj.com/sms.htm

And they there's Skype, but you guys all ready know about that. Thank Goodness for Skype.

Edited December 3, 2006 by Peterson

[BlueRain77 0]

Future phone worked great, but now when I call it says the number is full. Must be that TOO many people have used it. Or they don't like me. lol

They also talk about "any of their numbers" but they only have that one on the front of their website.

Other than that, it worked great, so if you can get through that's great!

The deal is that later they are going to sell advertising space to pay for the calls so when you dial up there will be a 30 sec or less add before you are connected. I hope it works out for them. Its a great idea.

[one...two...tree 2,762]

from the link you posted...

I tested out this service, and it’s exactly what it promises to be: free overseas phone calls. I chatted casually with my friend Guillaume in France and Albert in Spain (whom longtime Pogue’s Posts readers will remember as my Barcelona tour guide this summer).

The one disappointment: I couldn’t seem to reach cellphone numbers. The company says that it’s still working out agreements with the cell carriers in some countries.

[brnidokiegurl 0]

doesn't seem to apply for Morocco

[Chris-n-Veronica 0]

doesn't seem to apply for Morocco

Yahoo has pretty good rates and the link in my sig. is the next best thing... Yahoo was .10 per min to Moldova landline...and .25 to a cell.. my link is .13 per min landline or cell to moldova..