For those who are puzzled by the term visual voicemail: see Wikipedia. Its a graphical user interface to the voice mail menu you used to access via numpad over GSM. Good news is, some folks are collaborating on making a standard for visual voicemail.

In the days of the answering machine the person who phoned paid to leave a message. Queue voicemail, you pay twice. And again to configure the damn thing. I don't like it, I rather put it off. If it is important 1) I phone back 2) person who phoned sends SMS 3) or that person phones back. No need for voicemail. At worst, if really necessary implement it on local level on the device, much like an answering machine.