Google Gives Voicemail to Homeless in SF Trial Run

Google is working with homeless shelters in San Francisco to let them offer free phone numbers and voicemail boxes to their clients for life. The aim is to let shelters provide these facilities directly to their clients instead of requiring the homeless to register individually for a free phone number and voicemail box as they do now. Google will set up Web sites where staff of homeless shelters can log in and get blocks of virtual phone numbers and mailboxes for their clients. The service is a continuation of what San Francisco startup Grand Central was doing before Google bought it last year.