I’ve been holding my breath like a petulant toddler waiting for the day when TalkPlus announced that their application could be used with Symbian devices. At long last (and over a year from when I’d first heard about this) I can let out a long exhale. The company that purports to be able to rewrite the definition of what is possible with a mobile phone is the brave move of “throwing the application to the bloggers” to take their accolades (or lumps) come what may.

In a wise move TalkPlus has retained Andy Abramson of Comunicano (who developed and continues to run the Nokia blogger outreach program that has received so much critical acclaim) to oversee the selection of bloggers and the administration of this hi-scrutiny beta. Disclosure: I am a participant in a number of Comunicano’s bloggger outreach programs including the Nokia program and the TalkPlus program as well.

As soon as I heard about the opportunity to test TalkPlus I jumped over to the private site and completed the sign-up and installation of the TalkPlus client on my Nokia N95 Smartphone. So far so good. The sign up and installation have gone off without a hitch. Now I’ve got to see about testing the application…

Of course you are probably wondering just what TalkPlus does. In short, imagine a high end desk-phone like the kind you would expect to see in some CEO’s office. Multiple lines, check, instant conference calling; check, intelligent call routing; check again. Ability to originate a call from a German exchange so you can talk locally to your German friends while you are in Los Angeles? Check. What??????????????

Yup, this is where TalkPlus started raising eyebrows a couple of years ago. It seems that with some VoIP-tastic engineering they’ve concocted a secret telephony routing sauce that will save you money, simplify your phone book and in a twist that apparently added about a year to their development time while they tried to figure out how to not totally alienate the carriers in spite of this cost saving coup de grace.

There’s more actually, but since I wrote about this previously back when I was the author of MobileCrunch I’ll just post an excerpt of that article below. Stay tuned for an interview with TalkPlus CEO Jeff Black and my first hand impressions after actually using this bleeding edge technology.

excerpted from my former blog MobileCrunch was this portion of a post on TalkPlus functions
In case you haven’t read about the company previously, TalkPlus, which refers to their advanced suite of telephony services for mobile devices as Voice 2.0 brings VoIP call management tools to mobile phones. So what does this mean? Well, the ability to have more than one phone number mapped to a single phone for one, and also the ability to deliver outbound caller ID information as multiple different identities

The difference is far more than cosmetic though. Let’s say you have a mobile with number xxx-xxx-xxxx. You could have a second TalkPlus number that is yyy-yyy-yyyy that would ring also to your mobile. Moreover when people from area code yyy call you on your yyy number they are making a local call, as are you when you call them. The same goes for your xxx number.

According to TalkPlus (and their original demo from DEMO Fall) you can have both domestic and international numbers on the same phone and again get the same kind of localized access for each. This functionality however is for the future as what they are planning on rolling out henceforth is basic second number functionality- in essence the xxx-xxx-xxxx/yyy-yyy-yyyy example I just provided.

There’s more to the offering however. Talk plus allows you to exquisitely customize the behavior of the phone on a per-caller basis. Some people you never want to hear from can be directed to receive a fast busy signal every time they call whereas your dearest Mum - well - if you really want her to, you can make is so that she can reach you all the time, even cutting through the do not disturb option that currently doesn’t exist on a cell phone unless you use the “off” button.

The customization does not stop there. Using the call management functionality that is accessed online you can also control voice messaging providing a different outbound message for each number as well as controlling quite specifically options for reviewing messages - even specifying that messages from certain callers are heard before anyone else. All in all the features sound like a vast improvement over current mobile telephony options and I’m sure that I will find them very useful provided that the company does in fact finally make good on its promised beta for those that have been waiting so (im)patiently.

To this point Jeff assured me that the passwords that were circulated during DEMO Fall are still good and that everyone that is still so inclined can have their promised trial just as soon as they launch the service. If the technology were any less impressive this author would be inclined to turn a deaf ear, however, I clearly recall just how wowed I was during their demonstration and it is probably for this reason that I was so disappointed in their prior failure to launch the service before.

Following the launch of the basic TalkPlus service with only a single additional number, the company plans to enable multiple additional numbers per single mobile number as well as further improvements to include international as well as domestic numbers.

In any event, it looks as if the company is now on track to keep the promises they made back in 2005 and I for one can’t wait to give the service a try and see if it’s every bit as exceptional as their VC’s and more than one blogger hope it to be.