JMP is a fully FOSS service providing a way to get a real phone number that operates over the internet using XMPP. They provide numbers in the USA and Canada with everything you need to access SMS/MMS/etc. and voice calls using your XMPP (or SIP) clients of choice across all your devices. They are committed to growing the use of open communications technology such as XMPP, ultimately working to help people move their communication off the unencrypted telephone network and onto the federated, encrypted, and diverse Jabber network.
We thank JMP for sponsoring OSNews this week, and they even offer a discount code for OSNews readers who sign up for the service. Use the code OSNEWS for one free month after paying for your account initially.
I have been a jmp.chat user for several years, as I was previously a Grandcentral/Google Voice user, and am really happy with their service. Sure, it costs a couple bucks, but it’s very worth it. Their support is great, and I’ve had no issues with the service. If anyone else is looking to de-Google their lives, this is a worthy replacement.
…and as a Linux user, I love that the Dino-im client fully works with jmp.chat so essentially my text messages are available on any platform. Glad to hear they’re working with OSnews.
“Get it on F-Droid” gets bonus points! As simple as this is to appease alternative users, this is something most services are sorely lacking.
I’m not sure how strict they are about this. My primary use case would be business and I’ve actually been trying to find a better way of dealing with spam calls. Some weeks they are not that bad, but at other times the spam calls come in all day long. Blacklisting doesn’t work since the CID is always a random number. I’ve been looking for a VOIP service provider that will automate a simple voice menu to confirm the caller is a human before passing the call through.
The “business purpose” limitation it a bit fuzzy. Officially the carrier consider any SMS sent for “business purposes” identical to automated messaging, but obviously in real life that isn’t compatible with what most people consider “business purposes” to mean. If it’s a number for person-to-person communication and you will talk about your business sometimes, probably fine. If you want to use it for customer support or sales or some other person-to-person case that is very strongly business associated, you can ask our customer support team about the JMP for Business trial.
I’m pretty certain that the language about “business purposes” is all about not wanting their service to be used for outgoing spam.
David Adams,
Banning unsolicited calls makes sense. IIRC it’s against federal law US law to cold call anyway. IMHO if that is the actual intention the FAQ should be updated to say it explicitly. After reading singpolyma’s post I think the source of this language might not actually be spam related but a possible restriction under their carrier contract. Hypothetically the carriers themselves might impose “business purpose” and “automation” restrictions because they wish to segment the market.
I use a voip number with virtual assistant as public number and it do filter out the crap. I use voip.ms with simple call redirect.
gagol2,
You know – I looked at this very solution! Alas voip.ms are on captial one’s secret internal blacklist (captial one is a bank). I didn’t even know such a thing existed, but after numerous calls and escalations it was confirmed, they were refusing to release any payments to voip.ms and there is nothing I could do to whitelist/override the block. We were going to be forced to open up new banking accounts and juggle money around but by then I was at my wits end and gave up. I don’t know what they did to piss off the bank so badly, but obviously the bank has the last laugh since they can literally block the flow of money from other customers 🙁
I’ve been looking for a GVoice replacement since They opted to route calls through the SIM. Talkatone is paltry at best.
Pretty cool. I was not aware about such service existing at all. I my use it someday.
First ad I’ve clicked on for as long as I can remember. If you keep thoughtfully bringing in useful sponsors like this, I may have to click on more! 🙂
(Sadly, the service itself wont fill the need I have, but it’s certainly adjacent to said needs!)
Would love to hear about your needs and if there’s anything adjacent to what we do now we could maybe solve for people in the future!
singpolyma,
I have a few comments.
1) I had trouble finding documentation for your command interface other than random commands in the FAQ, is it documented somewhere?
2) I was misusing the pricing widget on this page.
https://jmp.chat/pricing/USD
I typed in my local area code and it priced calls at $0.20/min, which is insane. However then I realized I was meant to enter “1” before it and that price was $0.0087/min. Obviously this was user error, but I’m probably not alone in using it wrong – many of us aren’t used to dialing a country code.
3) JMP looks like it offers some interesting connectivity options. Do you know if I can use both jabber and sip clients at the same time?
4) For business reasons, we don’t have the option to simply block unrecognized callers, but spam calls have been a chronic problem. I’ve really been looking for something like the “virtual assistant” mentioned earlier to require the caller to interact with a touch tone menu before ringing the line. It’s something I’d be very interested in if JMP offered this capability.
1) The commands are meant to be mostly self-documenting, but we can certainly improve that if some are unclear
2) Ah, yes, that page is mostly about international pricing (since all of USA+Canada is one price) but I can see how that might not be obvious to a new user. I’ll make a note
3) For outbound calls yes, you can use an connected Jabber client or the SIP account at any time, and even simultaneously (within reason). Inbound calls however only go to one or the other at the moment.
4) We don’t have this kind of call screening feature yet, but it’s a common request and we are definitely considering the best way to implement this. You may also find services like https://jollyrogertelephone.com/ interesting