Irony Alert: Google Voice On iPhone

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Google is now offering a Google Voice app via iTunes for iPhone users. You can download it here and, yes, it is free.

Is it me? Or does this sound "ironical" as a friend of mine would say, and that is using a "phone" to bypass using the phone?

The truth is it's great news for iPhone users who can now save their minutes on calls and texts, as well as save gobs of money on international calls.

Just a few days ago, TechCrunch writer Alexia Tsotsis breathlessly announced, "The Phone Call Is Dead". Read her fine print and, in so many words, she acknowledges the phone call is more like mostly dead (to use some Princess Bride-speak). 

Granted, TechCrunch loves to declare things dead:

- "Yep, Apple Killed The CD Today"

- "HP Slate is Dead on Arrival"

- TechCrunch declares openness dead

- "Rest In Peace, RSS"

- Apple TV is Dead

- Instant messaging expected to die in 2010

- "Why Commercial Radio is Dead"

Regardless, the point is well-taken. Traditional phone calls as we know them, are being made less and less. VoIP options like Skype and Google Voice and the real phone-killer, SMS texting, are taking over. 

Latest Nielsen numbers show voice calls are down in every age demographic, except the over-54 crowd. 

It leaves me to wonder if Apple was short-sighted calling it an iPhone. 

Perhaps not. The new Google Voice app does not work on the iPod Touch.

You may follow me on Twitter @oricchio. No phone calls, please.

Renee Oricchio is a technology writer and former supervising news producer for CNN Financial News. She has been covering the computer industry since 1987. @oricchio