Keeping promises it made during its orgy of portal deals back in May (CI No 3,407), AT&T has announced two new services which combine voice and internet traffic in new ways. Both are available through Lycos and Excite as well as att.com and att.net. The absurdly named Chat ‘N’ Talk service lets net users make an anonymous phone call to anyone in an internet chat room. The caller clicks on an icon, enters credit card details and identifies the person they want to call. The AT&T network connects the parties without revealing either phone number. If you’re wondering who’d bother to use such a service, think Internet Relay Chat channel #hottub and work down from there. Click2Dial Conferencing is a little more corporate in tone. With it, net users can set up and control own their own conference calls without assistance from ingratiating operators called Sheri or Todd. A web interface lets the conference host enter the telephone numbers of up to seven participants in mainland USA, Alaska or Hawaii. Once the call is in progress, the host can mute, add or delete participants. Both services are available immediately, but they’re not exactly cheap. Chat ‘N’ Talk has $0.50 set up fee and costs $0.25 per minute, while Click2Dial is charged at $0.15 per minute per person. Nor will everybody be able to use them, since both require a telephone line that is separate from the internet connection.
