Part of the magic for those who signed up for Google Voice, the phone call management application rejected by Apple and vilified by AT&T for skewering network neutrality principles, is that they get to choose a special Google phone number that will ring their home, work or mobile phones.

Users of the service also enjoy using voicemail transcription, call recording, call screening and SMS-to-email, among other nice features.

But not everyone wants another phone number to use, even if it rings all of their active phones. To that end, Google moved a step closer to number portability today by offering a tradeoff. The company released a version of Google Voice that lets users make their mobile phone number the contact point for Google Voice.

The catch is that users who opt to use this "lighter version of Google Voice" won't be able to receive online voicemail, automated text transcripts, and custom voicemail greetings, a Google spokesperson told eWEEK. Users will still get all of the other Google voicemail functionality, as the company explains in this post an