Finally some good is coming of Google’s acquisition of Gizmo5. GMail’s chat application already supports voice and video chatting, and was recently released for Linux. Now it would seem that Google will also offer the ability to make calls to phone numbers from the GMail interface.
Google is currently also running a limited preview of it’s Google Voice service, which assigns you a free Google number which you can connect with your all your current phone numbers to have one universal phone number. Not only can this phone number be connected with up to 6 other phone numbers, any calls made to this number will also be automatically transcribed. As you result you can actually search through your Google Voice interface for conversations you have had with others or SMS messages sent to or from it.
This could mean that Google Voice, which is quite similar interface-wise to GMail, might eventually become integrated into the same interface instead of being a separate service.
UPDATE:
Google has now officially launched this service on their own GMail blog. Entirely unsurprisingly this service will only be available in the US for now, with a broader release over time. It will work with your Google Voice number and you will be able to not only make calls but also receive any calls made to this number.
Check out Google’s humorous video about this new feature: