Show HN: Puput, listen to your email for free when traveling, using missed calls | Hacker News Reader

Show HN: Puput, listen to your email for free when traveling, using missed calls

puput.io

16 pointscarlesfe19 comments

Hello HN,

First of all, let me say that this community is a bit guilty that I left my job two years ago and launched a startup, so I wanted to share it with you :)

We are doing a soft launch of Puput, a service that lets you hear your emails (and more) for free when you have no internet, with a missed call. We've spent some time doing R+D in the telephony field and we saw that the "tone" that plays before a phone pickup can be changed from the server, so that's what we did.

After experimenting with email login, we decided to structure the product as an email inbox, where you can forward important emails using filters, and this address will misscall you when there is a new message. You don't pick up that call, but misscall back. Then the server will play a TTS (or a voice memo, if attached) with the email contents, and hang up... without picking up.

We decided to launch it for free to get feedback and see its acceptance. We plan to make money with custom integrations, basically doing consulting to integrate Puput with businesses. We have more complex products which we think aren't very attractive to end users, but can be interesting for businesses: slack integration (call everyone to make sure a message is received), broadcast audio messages with a single call, alert escalation like pagerduty, package tracking using GPS without a data plan...

It's difficult to find which uses are the best fit for a "new" technology, so we decided to tell hackers first -- data with missed calls is actually new, but it seems we are the first ones to use it in production.

Some friends already signed up, and nothing has exploded yet. We’d really, really love your feedback. It’s a service built by hackers, for hackers, and we chose email specifically because it is scriptable and decentralized (read more here https://medium.com/@puput_io/email-will-not-be-killed-ce4387...)

It all started with a simple asterisk hack which sent data to a Postfix filter... and here we are today! I think it’s pretty cool.

Please share your feedback!

Carlos

I see this as interesting tool to monitor our system. we are currently using pagerduty that has also phone calls (I personally prefer calls than SMS). I think calls are pretty cheap in US but they charge you more in Europe. . I definetilly will give a try. Good luck!

I would be surprised if this doesn't constitute a violation of Terms of Service somewhere along the line? Something that could provide grounds for one of the telecom companies involved to have it taken down, if it were to be successful.

Basically, it means that you can send information (in one direction only), without paying for use of the telecom network. Taken to an extreme, it should be possible to create a "free walkie talkie" app that worked all over the world, for free, by repeatedly calling back and forth but never connecting the call.

It is definitely a gray area.

We've wandered through many providers, and while some have ToS against missed calls, the provider we're currently using doesn't. And we just reached a partnership with a local provider to whom we'll pay the residual costs of missed calls, and they'll guarantee us the lines. For them, it's business, and for us, it's not 100% free but much cheaper than regular calls.

Regarding the walkie talkie app, yes, that's our goal :) However, one of the parties will need to have an internet connection to send the message. Receiving it is free though.

Just tried it and I like it, but activating it might translate into information overload. Without filters I get a call for every single email I receive, and adding a filter implies that I need to know what is considered important.

You're right. That's why we initially aimed this tool at hackers, who are expert on categorizing their own data.

For regular users, probably your best bet is to filter emails which Gmail determines as "important" by itself. Or, at least, you can filter out for subject "Important", those of your significant other, etc.

We'll definitely think this through, thanks for your feedback!

I'd definitely use this if I could just forward specific emails to an address for them to be read out.

I'm pretty sure I've implemented this in Asterisk once, years ago, but Asterisk is a real pain.

Kudos for seeing it through.

Edit: Oh, right, I was assuming you asked for an oauth token to my mailbox, but forwarding makes more sense

Yes, that's the basic use case actually.

We provide an email address, you create some filters, and any incoming message will be read to you.

Feel free to ask if you have more questions!

I'm not sure it will work in Australia. I'm pretty sure Telstra will charge for an international call from a cell, even if it's not "picked up"

Edit: works - now let's see if I'm charged

Great! Did you get charged? We haven't yet found any telco that charges for missed calls, but if you did, please let us know so that we can warn other users :)

I don't think so, but the usage details from Telstra can take a while to show up.

Hey guys!

Nice system you've got. I feel inclined to warn you and Australians that this service will probably incur you a fee per callback. Here in Australia we have a system where simply dialing a number incurs a fee, known as a "flagfall".

Please see: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flagfall

Thanks guys!

Didn't receive a call on my Australian mobile number.

Incoming calls here don't cost the receiver anything so the instruction not to answer is a bit strange.

Hi voltagex, would you mind writting to support@puput.io with your phone number? We've had problems with some international numbers and area codes, I'll debug it for you.

Regarding incoming calls, the instructions not to answer are to avoid the cost for us, not for the user. Receiving calls is free, but connecting a call costs some cents. That's why we work with missed calls. Makes sense?

But then wouldn't you be charged if I hit "decline" and you get my voicemail?

This is brilliant! a proper hack of the telephony system :)

Would it be possible to send info encoded as sound? Then have a special phone/mail app on your smartphone that will get that sound and convert it to email, so you can actually read it, receive attachments, etc or even reply to it :)

(Enhorabona! És sempre una al·legria veure innovació feta a Barcelona :))

Brilliant idea, I'm starting to use it and I'm really excited with such a clever idea. Wish you the best, and eager to see future developments and applications

That's a hilariously clever use of telephony APIs. I have no use for the product myself right now but it's an interesting, novel idea.

Thanks! I really appreciate it :)

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