4 ms·

As usual on these lists, no alternatives to Music, and no alternatives to Voice. Voice is the big one for anyone who's still on it I think.

coldtea 6y ago
Google Music? Isn't there Apple, Amazon, Spotify, and tons of others?
- reificator 6y ago
  See above replies, for the feature that matters most to me (seamless playback between subscription and personally uploaded tracks) Apple seems like the only actual competitor.
throwaway123x2 6y ago
Yup, this is me. There is no alternative to Google Voice, which is sad... it's such a neat service.
- tyingq 6y ago
  Anveo.com isn't free, but it is cheap, and replaces Google Voice for what I needed. The call flow stuff is cool.
  - reificator 6y ago
    Opposite of where I was in 2008/2009 or whenever it was, free is not a requirement and honestly I probably wouldn't migrate to another free service. Thanks for the suggestion!
- swlkr 6y ago
  There is textnow, not sure how many missing features there are though
- toomuchtodo 6y ago
  I moved my Google Voice number to OpenPhone [1] (YC S18). No relation besides being a paid ($10/month) customer. If you have T-Mobile in the US, they have a similar offering called DIGITS [2] you might try (although OpenPhone offers more features for the price). [1] https://www.openphone.co https://www.openphone.co [2] https://www.t-mobile.com/offers/t-mobile-digits https://www.t-mobile.com/offers/t-mobile-digits
  - ivank 6y ago
    I signed up for OpenPhone just now, but then noticed that the only thing you need to log in to someone's account is their email and a 6 digit code emailed to their account. There are no password or 2FA options. I haven't tested how rate-limited the login attempts are, but it seems like too much to ask for customers to trust that they exist and work, especially when the apparent attack success probability is already > 1/1M.
    - toomuchtodo 6y ago
      Your access to your email account is your password (magic link-esq). Agreed that 2FA is desirable (not sure if it's on their roadmap, will have to ping them and ask). If 2FA is a hard requirement, building your own solution on top of Twilio is preferable (as they require 2FA).
      - ivank 6y ago
        Thanks. I agree with you, except a 6 digit code is worse than a good random password, or magic link with e.g. 64 bits of entropy.
  - reificator 6y ago
    Thanks for the suggestions!
lima 6y ago
In Europe, we don't even have Google Voice to begin with :(
- smnrchrds 6y ago
  Neither do we in Canada. It's a US-only service.
colordrops 6y ago
Isn't music one of the easier ones to replace? Spotify, apple, many others.
- reificator 6y ago
  Not if your usage of Google Play Music is to seamlessly mix your personal collection (Particularly one-offs, local bands, bootlegs, parodies, mashups, obscure artists, older music, etc) with a pretty full subscription service. From what I've heard if you're on iOS you can do this with Apple Music, but that's about it. Everyone else seems to think their collection is good enough that you won't need anything else.
  - wobblykiwi 6y ago
    Google Play Music is shutting down. I haven't checked recently, but did they update Youtube Music to allow personal uploads?
    - syjer 6y ago
      Yes you can upload: https://support.google.com/youtubemusic/answer/9716522?hl=en https://support.google.com/youtubemusic/answer/9716522?hl=en . The UI/UX of youtube music is lacking compared to GPM, but at least the file locker functionality that I use is still here.
      - dorkinspace 6y ago
        Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that you can upload your music to YTM but it isn't seamlessly integrated into your listened experience like it is on GPM. Is that right? If so, that is losing the best aspect of GPM.
      - ivank 6y ago
        Just don't make my mistake of using YouTube Music from your brand account on YouTube, or you'll always see this when trying to upload music: Switch accounts to upload You're signed in to an account that doesn't support uploading. To upload music, switch to your personal Google account. Learn more There's no way to share or migrate liked songs, apparently. And YouTube Music never warns you about the upload limitation before you start using it from "the wrong account".

coldtea 6y ago

Google Music? Isn't there Apple, Amazon, Spotify, and tons of others?

reificator 6y ago
See above replies, for the feature that matters most to me (seamless playback between subscription and personally uploaded tracks) Apple seems like the only actual competitor.

throwaway123x2 6y ago

Yup, this is me. There is no alternative to Google Voice, which is sad... it's such a neat service.

tyingq 6y ago
Anveo.com isn't free, but it is cheap, and replaces Google Voice for what I needed. The call flow stuff is cool.
- reificator 6y ago
  Opposite of where I was in 2008/2009 or whenever it was, free is not a requirement and honestly I probably wouldn't migrate to another free service. Thanks for the suggestion!
swlkr 6y ago
There is textnow, not sure how many missing features there are though
toomuchtodo 6y ago
I moved my Google Voice number to OpenPhone [1] (YC S18). No relation besides being a paid ($10/month) customer. If you have T-Mobile in the US, they have a similar offering called DIGITS [2] you might try (although OpenPhone offers more features for the price). [1] https://www.openphone.co https://www.openphone.co [2] https://www.t-mobile.com/offers/t-mobile-digits https://www.t-mobile.com/offers/t-mobile-digits
- ivank 6y ago
  I signed up for OpenPhone just now, but then noticed that the only thing you need to log in to someone's account is their email and a 6 digit code emailed to their account. There are no password or 2FA options. I haven't tested how rate-limited the login attempts are, but it seems like too much to ask for customers to trust that they exist and work, especially when the apparent attack success probability is already > 1/1M.
  - toomuchtodo 6y ago
    Your access to your email account is your password (magic link-esq). Agreed that 2FA is desirable (not sure if it's on their roadmap, will have to ping them and ask). If 2FA is a hard requirement, building your own solution on top of Twilio is preferable (as they require 2FA).
    - ivank 6y ago
      Thanks. I agree with you, except a 6 digit code is worse than a good random password, or magic link with e.g. 64 bits of entropy.
- reificator 6y ago
  Thanks for the suggestions!

lima 6y ago

In Europe, we don't even have Google Voice to begin with :(

smnrchrds 6y ago
Neither do we in Canada. It's a US-only service.

colordrops 6y ago

Isn't music one of the easier ones to replace? Spotify, apple, many others.

reificator 6y ago
Not if your usage of Google Play Music is to seamlessly mix your personal collection (Particularly one-offs, local bands, bootlegs, parodies, mashups, obscure artists, older music, etc) with a pretty full subscription service. From what I've heard if you're on iOS you can do this with Apple Music, but that's about it. Everyone else seems to think their collection is good enough that you won't need anything else.
- wobblykiwi 6y ago
  Google Play Music is shutting down. I haven't checked recently, but did they update Youtube Music to allow personal uploads?
  - syjer 6y ago
    Yes you can upload: https://support.google.com/youtubemusic/answer/9716522?hl=en https://support.google.com/youtubemusic/answer/9716522?hl=en . The UI/UX of youtube music is lacking compared to GPM, but at least the file locker functionality that I use is still here.
    - dorkinspace 6y ago
      Please correct me if I'm wrong, but my understanding is that you can upload your music to YTM but it isn't seamlessly integrated into your listened experience like it is on GPM. Is that right? If so, that is losing the best aspect of GPM.
    - ivank 6y ago
      Just don't make my mistake of using YouTube Music from your brand account on YouTube, or you'll always see this when trying to upload music: Switch accounts to upload You're signed in to an account that doesn't support uploading. To upload music, switch to your personal Google account. Learn more There's no way to share or migrate liked songs, apparently. And YouTube Music never warns you about the upload limitation before you start using it from "the wrong account".