I think including a short comparison of other VoIP software for Smartphones (Android, iPhone, Nokia) would be helpful, especially comparing it to Skype Mobile. What do you think?

Re: Symbian: Ever since I’ve seen the iPhone and since I’ve bought an Android phone, I have had a feeling that proprietary platforms like Blackberry or Symbian are going to die a slow death. Android/iPhone are full-blown computers, and there is so much development going on (iPhone has 50K+ Apps, Android around 10K). Hell, on a rooted Android, you can install almost all of Debian’s 29K packages, just as if were a regular PC!

I think Nokia has realized this, because they are doing some GREAT stuff with Maemo, their own Linux-based platform for handhelds (maemo.org). Just look at this baby: http://www.mobile-review.com/review/nokia-rx51-n900-en.shtml

In my case, I use SIP via SipDroid on my HTC Magic. If you download the version from sipdroid.org, you can use SIP calling via Wi-Fi and EDGE (the Market version only supports Wi-Fi). When I call my GF in Miami, I pay 1.5c/min, compared to Skype’s 0.24c/min. And all from my phone! I simply love it.

Being a heavy VoIP user myself, I think we’d agree to say that Skype and GV might turn to be complementary solutions with time, as at the end customers may find it practical to easily switch from one solution to the other for their very own advantages (GV: possibility to route all their phones through – home, office and mobile, get voicemail transcript and give users a single voicemail account regardless of which phone messages are left on. / Skype: Lower calling costs vs GV, possibility to use it through a mobile device with Nimbuzz, vidéo on IP).

I still see today a lot of people in the street carying a cellphone, an MP3 player, a digital camera, a notebook, an even a small pad to take down notes. I find it weird when I know that we today have all the above technology built in within a single device, call it iPhone, Nokia N serie or other. So I dont think this would be a problem for “Mr Jones” to use Skype and GV to cover complementary features on the same device.

With regards to calling costs we now know that domestic calls will be free with GV but international calls will require users to set up a Google Checkout account. EBay’s Skype offers free domestic and international calls made over the internet from one computer to another and customers can call landlines and cell phones around the world for a very low cost. International calls can eventually be completely free if some customers are phone addicts and decide to subscribe to either a domestic, Europe or World contract (cost ranges from $2.95 a month to $9.95 a month for unlimited calls worldwide). But at the end, Skype is still cheaper than Google Voice (see cost table for Google Voice vs Skype’s). Too bad though that Skype isn’t yet compatible with SIP like Gizmo or Vike are. There is indeed something to cover in that field…

But if Google perfects its speech-to-text feature to other languages, this solution could be very powerful given the globalisation of markets. Language is another barrier and when you break that down, the world of communications opens up and globally this has exciting opportunities.

But unfortunately as usual, whenever Google announces a new product, the behemoth typically builds excitement by only letting a select group of people trickle in. Let’s just hope as you say, that Europe won’t be left behind for too long!