David Pogue, unusually effusive about a service that links all your phone numbers, makes a huge mistake -- and I think this service will quickly vanish. Why? Here is the service, in a nutshell:
Its motto, “One number for life,” pretty much says it all. At GrandCentral.com, you choose a new, single, unified phone number (more on this in a moment). You hand it out to everyone you know, instructing them to delete all your old numbers from their Rolodexes.
From now on, whenever somebody dials your new uninumber, all of your phones ring simultaneously, like something out of “The Lawnmower Man.”
And this is a benefit because why? David, and the people who run the service, clearly believe that people a) really want to take their work calls at home and their home calls at work, not something that is going to be a big sell with folks already stressed about the blurring of work and home; and b) if my home phone rings when someone calls my one number and it's a work issue and my mom is visiting, what the heck does she do?
Setting aside my momentary Luddite tendencies, there are some features of this service that WILL catch on and be seen in the near term as "can't live without." It's the ability to smoothly pass a call from one phone to the next -- to take a call on my work phone, transition it easily to my mobile and then again to my home -- all without huge distraction. THAT is something that will be good.