Gmail Voicemail On Its Way?

To paraphrase Paris Hilton….this is hot. There is this post over on ZDnet where Garett Rogers has examined a new version of the Gmail source code and discovered that voicemail and Evite.com integration are both referenced, implying that they might be upcoming features of the Gmail service.

He writes: "A voicemail service will allow people to use Gmail as an answering machine that won’t run out of space or need rewinding — who knows, maybe it will be searchable using speech to text technology.  This service will be most useful when Google starts providing full VoIP services, but until then it could be used for missed GTalk calls.  Recorded messages will be available for listening through Gmail — possibly with a flash applet designed to play them like Google Reader’s podcast feature."

For anyone who has said "what has Google done lately?": HA! First chat integration, then Gmail for your domain, now this? Amazing. I’m sure this is for real, and not just an internet rumor. Now if we could just figure out how to get every person on the planet to use Gmail….