It looks like telephone companies are finally offering "the phones of the future." I have been waiting for a home phone like this, ever since the iPhone came out. I was sure telephone companies would try to mimic the iPhone's features sooner than later. Verizon, so far, is the first to advertise the Verizon Hub on TV. And it looks as though AT&T has started selling a similar version called Home Manager online, but has not really advertised it, (at least not here in the east coast).
Verizon Hub and AT&T Home Manager seem to have similar features - both include a 7 inch touch screen access. You can receive traffic updates, weather, news, sports, directions, watch movie trailers, order a pizza on both phones. Other phone features include - a phone contact list, calendar reminders, you can receive and send text messages, video messages and visual voice mail (this feature transcribes your voicemail to text so you can read it and don't have to listen to it, which makes it easier if you missed a phone number or address).
Now we just need the phone companies to figure out a way to sync-up home phones and cell phones. So when you're on the road and someone calls your home phone, your cell phone rings too. This way you'll never miss another important call again. All you can do right now with both Verizon's Hub and AT&T Home Manager is sync-up your calendar events, reminders and you can send text messages to cell phones. But the cell phone and the home phone have different numbers and are still considered separate entities. Phone companies should think about creating something similar to Google Voice, one number for both cell phones and home phones. Now that these new home phones can work seamlessly with the internet, this is the next logical step.
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