Obihai,
how will this affect our use of our OBi devices?
http://www.pocketables.com/2013/03/google-will-unify-all-existing-chat-clients-under-babble.html (http://www.pocketables.com/2013/03/google-will-unify-all-existing-chat-clients-under-babble.html)
I don't represent Obi but Google usually rolls things out and removes services in a predictable fashion. There is no way to tell how this will effect us, however Google doesn't usually shut things off completely without giving it's users a heads up. For instance with Google reader they didn't make a lot of fuss but they told us they were shutting it down. They usually give notice so users can migrate. With new services they release necessary info so developers can create apps for their new services.
My prediction is that Google will release a dev kit when they announce this new service so developers can create applications for it. The old services will likely be phased out slowly over months or years. This should give ObiHai the ability to adapt and create new firmwares.
Wired just wrote about it:
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2013/04/google-voice-future-uncertain/