T-Mobile gave its Bobsled VoIP service a boost with the start of the CTIA phone show by expanding it beyond Facebook. The service is now available on the regular web through a Facebook sign-on but also through free iOS app as well as an Free Android app. While the mobile apps don’t offer text messaging, they provide the same emphasis on calling and leaving voice messages, whether to Facebook contacts or real-world numbers.
The real-world numbers themselves are a jump, T-Mobile said. Members can now call both cellular and landline phone numbers in Canada and the US, including Puerto Rico, for free. Users themselves don’t get a real number for others to call, although T-Mobile has suggested this could change.
Bobsled users don’t need to be T-Mobile customers and can use a non-phone device like an iPod touch to make a call. The company in mentioning the iOS support was unusually emphatic that it wasn’t selling Apple products.
T-Mobile is willing to make the rare giveaway to help build its share but may also be deconstructing the incentives behind AT&T’s proposed but legally challenged $39 billion takeover. Without a traditional landline service or dominant cellular network to protect, it doesn’t have to worry about cannibalizing an existing service.
