System for accessing multimedia mailboxes and messages over the internet and via telephone

A message storage and retrieval system, comprising:

• a telephone;
• a telephone network coupled to said telephone;
• a computer including a digital network browser;
• a digital network coupled to the computer;
• and
• a distributed architecture message system coupled to said telephone network and said digital network, said message system comprising:
• a digital switch coupled to said telephone network;
• a control unit storing addresses of multimedia messages of a single mailbox for each subscriber including voice, text, and video messages, and controlling switching of said digital switch;
• a processing unit coupled to said digital switch, storing and retrieving the multimedia messages, and outputting the voice and text messages to said telephone as audio over said telephone network responsive to telephone commands;
• a local network coupled to said control unit and said processing unit;
• and
• a network unit coupled to the digital network and said local network including a data conversion cache, providing a home page with a message list including message identifiers comprising a session number and a randomly assigned file identifier responsive to a home page request by the browser, retrieving the messages from the processing unit and streaming the messages to the computer responsive to browser message play requests to the home page having an expired expiration date, the computer playing an audio of the voice messages in real-time as the voice messages are received, displaying an image of the text messages in real-time as the video messages are received, and displaying images of video messages in real-time as the video messages are received, and said computer recording a message and forwarding a message to said network unit for storage in said processing unit.