Google Voice: Tailor-made for the way Hollywood does business

For most people in Hollywood, doing business is all about being in touch. Executives, agents, producers, and of course their assistants (along with us journalists) are glued to our blackberries and iPhones and headsets because we need to be in touch all the time. Whether it's rolling calls in the office or responding to quick messages on-the-go, it's not part of the job. It is the job.

Which is why Google Voice could literally revolutionize the lives of thousands of folks in Hollywood. Imagine all your devices tied to one phone number as part of a service that maintains all your contacts and records or transcribes every conversation. It doesn't matter if it's email, text, or talking, Google Voice has it -- and it's searchable.

Don't get too excited -- it's still in closed beta. But lifehacker has a preview that's pretty mind blowing. Here are the key features I can see folks in Hollywood loving:

-Voice mails are transcribed and sit right next to your e-mails and texts. The transcription is far from perfect, but it's probably as good, if not better than an assistant's notes. And most importantly, it's searchable. So you can search for information regardless of whether you got it in an e-mail or voice mail.

-One phone number sends call to whichever device, or devices, you want. So Google Voice can route calls to your work line or home phone or voice over IP (which Google will surely offer itself) or one of several mobile devices. Or all of them at once. Better yet, send certain calls to certain numbers. Want to make sure when your boss calls that it rings on every one of your phones? Or that nobody from your annoying family will bother you on your work line? Click a few buttons and boom, it's done.

-Keep all your contacts in Google. Anybody who has used GMail knows Google has a great way to store and manage contacts. The best part is that it auto-fills. Type in the first few letters of somebody's name and it'll automatically guess the rest.

-Somebody's calling and you want to hear what they have to say, but not talk? Listen into their voice mail as they record it.

-Is there important information in phone call? Stuff you might need to stick back in somebody's face when closing a deal or meeting them in court? Start and stop recording a call with the press of a button at any point.

-Leaving the office while you're talking to someone? Switch the call to another phone without dropping the call.

And like everything Google offers it'll probably be free. Wow. As far as life-changing tech for the entertainment biz, I don't think it gets much better than this.

(Thanks Lifehacker for the screenshots)