Lifehacker, a tech blog that caters to non-geeks with its time-saving tips on computers and gadgets, has a special place for voice mail alternatives in the website. Now I don't use voicemail and prefer text messages for reminders and sending notes to myself, but if you're a heavy voice mail user, need some archiving options and want to avoid the time-wasting prompts from your service, you might want to check out the voice mail alternatives.
Jott will not only send voice messages you make to your email, it also transcribes it. Rick Broida of Lifehacker was also very impressed at Jott's "Web 2.0-style interface" and found few minor mistakes in the voice transcription, but that's probably because he's a fast talker.
Braincast, a similar service to Jott doesn't do transcription. Like Jott, however, you can also organize and archive messages.
CallWave offers the same email forwarding with management and notification features and comes with a free Windows application that allows everything to sync to you computer.
GotVoice is a similar email basic forwarding service for your voice mails and a user interafce that gives you access to your voice mail archives anywhere there is an Internet connection.
As for Pinger, I'll let the inventors explain everything. (Video following.)
