|
Short Message Service (SMS) is a service available on most digital mobile phones (and other mobile devices, e.g. a Pocket PC, or occasionally even desktop computers) that permits the sending of short messages (also known as text messages, or more colloquially SMSes, texts or even txts) between mobile phones, other handheld devices and even landline telephones. The term text messaging and its variants are more commonly used in North America, the UK, and the Philippines, while most other countries prefer the term SMS. Text messages are often used to interact with automated systems, such as ordering products and services for mobile phones, or participating in contests. There are also many services available on the Internet that allow users to send text messages free of charge. History As with most other services and modules of functionality of the GSM system, no individual can claim the parenthood of SMS. It might be worth while to note this, since such attempts may still be seen - also from people that never took part in the GSM work on SMS. The idea of adding text messaging to the services of mobile users was latent in many communities of mobile communication services at the beginning of the 1980s. Experts from several of those communities contributed in the discussions on which should be the GSM services. Most thought of SMS as a means to alert the individual mobile user, e.g. on incoming voice mail, whereas others had more sophisticated applications in their minds, e.g. telemetry. However, few believed that SMS would be used as a means for sending text messages from one mobile user to another. As early as February 1985, after having already been discussed in GSM subgroup WP3, chaired by J. Audestad, SMS was considered in the main GSM group as a possible service for the new digital cellular system. In GSM document 'Services and Facilities to be provided in the GSM System' (GSM Doc 28/85 rev2, June 1985), both mobile originated and mobile terminated, including point-to-point and point-to-multipoint, short messages appear on the table of GSM teleservices. The discussions on the GSM services were then concluded in the recommendation GSM 02.03 'TeleServices supported by a GSM PLMN'. Here a rudimentary description of the three services was given: 1) Short message Mobile Terminated / Point-to-Point, 2) Short message Mobile Originated / Point-to-Point and 3) Short message Cell Broadcast. This was handed over to a new GSM body called IDEG (the Implementation of Data and Telematic Services Experts Group), which had its kickoff in May 1987 under the chairmanship of Friedhelm Hillebrand. The technical standard known today was largely created by IDEG (later WP4) as the two recommendations GSM 03.40 (the two point-to-point services merged together) and GSM 03.41 (cell broadcast). The first commercial SMS message was sent over the Vodafone GSM network in the United Kingdom on 3 December 1992, from Neil Papworth of Sema Group (using a personal computer) to Richard Jarvis of Vodafone (using an Orbitel 901 handset). The text of the message was "Merry Christmas". Initial growth was slow, with customers in 1995 sending on average only 0.4 messages per GSM customer per month. * One factor in the slow takeup of SMS was that operators were slow to set up charging systems, especially for prepaid subscribers, and eliminate billing fraud which was possible by changing SMSC settings on individual handsets to use the SMSCs of other operators. Over time, this issue was eliminated by switch-billing instead of billing at the SMSC and by new features within SMSCs to allow blocking of foreign mobile users sending messages through it. An example of a company that innovate in this subject is OsinetS.A.. By the end of 2000, the average number of messages per user reached 35. SMS was originally designed as part of GSM, but is now available on a wide range of networks, including 3G networks. However, not all text messaging systems use SMS, and some notable alternate implementations of the concept include J-Phone's SkyMail and NTT Docomo's Short Mail, both in Japan. E-mail messaging from phones, as popularized by NTT Docomo's i-mode and the RIM BlackBerry, also typically use standard mail protocols such as SMTP over TCP/IP. Technical details
Premium content SMS is widely used for delivering premium content such as news alerts, financial information, logos and ringtones. Such messages are also known as premium-rated short messages (PSMS). The subscribers are charged extra for receiving this premium content, and the amount is typically divided between the mobile network operator and the content provider (VASP) either through revenue share or a fixed transport fee. Premium short messages are also increasingly being used for "real-world" services. For example, some vending machines now allow payment by sending a premium-rated short message, so that the cost of the item bought is added to the user's phone bill or subtracted from the user's prepaid credits. A new type of 'free premium' or 'hybrid premium' content has emerged with the launch of text-service websites. These sites allow registered users to receive free text messages when items they are interested go on sale, or when new items are introduced. Popularity Short message services are developing very rapidly throughout the world. In 2000, just 17 billion SMS messages were sent; in 2001, the number was up to 250 billion, and by mid-2004, SMS messages were being sent at a rate of 500 billion messages per annum. At an average cost of USD 0.10 per message, this generates revenues in excess of $50 billion for mobile telephone operators and represents close to 100 text messages for every person in the world. SMS is particularly popular in Europe, Asia (excluding Japan; see below), Australia and New Zealand. Popularity has grown to a sufficient extent that the term texting (used as a verb meaning the act of mobile phone users sending short messages back and forth) has entered the common lexicon. In China, SMS is very popular, and has brought service providers significant profit (18 billion short messages were sent in 2001 *). SMS is hugely popular in India, where youngsters often send lots of text messages, and the companies provide alerts, infontainment, news, cricket scores update, railway / airline booking, mobile billing as well as banking services on SMS. Short messages are particularly popular amongst young urbanites. In many markets, the service is comparatively cheap. For example, in Australia a message typically costs between AUD 0.20 and AUD 0.25 to send (some pre-paid services charge AUD 0.01 btween their own phones), compared to a voice call, which costs somewhere between AUD 0.40 and AUD 2.00 per minute (commonly charged in half-minute blocks). Despite the low cost to the consumer, the service is enormously profitable to the service providers. At a typical length of only 190 bytes (incl. protocol overhead), more than 350 of these messages per minute can be transmitted at the same datarate as a usual voice call (9 kbit/s). Singapore and the Philippines The most frequent SMS users are found in Southeast Asia. In Singapore, hundreds of messages can be sent per month for free, after which messages cost between SGD 0.05 and SGD 0.07 each to send. The same pricing format is followed in the Philippines where the average user sent 2,300 messages in 2003, making it the world's most avid SMS nation. The Philippines sends around 350 to 400 million SMS messages daily, more than all the SMS volumes of European countries, America, and China combined. SMS is a part in almost all marketing campaigns, advocacy, and entertainment. In fact, SMS is so inexpensive (messages cost PHP 1.00 (about USD 0.02) to send and free of charge to receive), influential, powerful, and addictive for Filipinos that several local dotcoms like Chikka Messenger, GoFISH Mobile, and Bidshot now fully utilise SMS for their services. Europe Europe follows next behind Asia in terms of the popularity of the use of SMS. In 2003, an average of 16 billion messages were sent each month. Users in Spain sent a little more than fifty messages per month on average in 2003. In Italy, Germany and the United Kingdom the figure was around 35–40 SMS messages per month. In each of these countries the cost of sending an SMS message varies from as little as £0.03–£0.18 depending on the payment plan. Curiously France has not taken to SMS in the same way, sending just under 20 messages on average per user per month. France has the same GSM technology as other European countries so the uptake is not hampered by technical restrictions. Part of the reason for the lack of uptake may be due to the higher prices caused by weak competition in the mobile market—the key player Orange is owned by subsidised France Télécom. However some telecom analysts suggest that this factor has dissipated in recent years and say that the reason may be cultural—text messaging is associated with a fast pace of life and France is more reluctant than others to dispense with its traditions. In Ireland, a total of 1.5 billion messages are sent every quarter, on average 114 messages per person per month. * The Eurovision Song Contest organised the first pan-European SMS-voting in 2002, as a part of the voting system (there was also a voting over traditional phone lines). In 2005, the Eurovision Song Contest organised the biggest televoting ever (with SMS and phone voting). United States In the United States, however, the appeal of SMS is even more limited. Although an SMS message usually costs only US$0.10 (many providers also offer monthly text messaging plans), only 13 messages were sent by the average user in 2003. In the US, SMS is often charged both at the sender and at the destination, but it cannot be rejected or dismissed, as opposed to the phone calls. The reasons for this are varied—many users have unlimited "mobile-to-mobile" minutes, high monthly minute allotments, or unlimited service. Moreover, push to talk services offer the instant connectivity of SMS and are typically unlimited. Furthermore, the integration between competing providers and technologies necessary for cross-network text messaging has only been available recently. Some providers originally charged extra to enable use of text, further reducing its usefulness and appeal. The relative popularity of e-mail-based devices such as the BlackBerry in North America may be a response to the weakness of text messaging there, but these further weaken the appeal of texting among the users most likely to use it. However the recent addition of AT&T-powered SMS voting on the television program American Idol has introduced many Americans to SMS, and usage is on the rise. Finland In addition to SMS voting, a different phenomenon has risen in more mobile-phone-saturated countries. In Finland some TV channels began "SMS Chat", which involved sending short messages to a phone number, and the messages would be shown on TV a while later. Chats are always moderated, which prevents sending harmful material to the channel. The craze soon became popular and evolved into games, first slow-paced quiz and strategy games. After a while, faster paced games were designed for television and SMS control. Games tend to involve registering one's nickname, and after that sending short messages for controlling a character on screen. Messages usually cost 0.05 to 0.86 euros apiece, and games can require the player to send dozens of messages. In December 2003, a Finnish TV-channel, MTV3, put a Father Christmas character on air reading aloud messages sent in by viewers. Some customers were later accused of "hacking" after they discovered a way to control Santa's speech synthesiser. More recent late-night attractions on the same channel include "Beach Volley", in which the bikini-clad female hostess blocks balls "shot" by short message. On March 12 2004, the first entirely "interactive" TV-channel "VIISI" began operation in Finland. That did not last long though, as SBS Finland Oy took over the channel and turned it into a music channel named "The Voice" in November 2004. Japan Text messaging is also popular in Japan. However, it is known by different names depending on the mobile service. With NTT DoCoMo, it is known as "i-mode mail." With AU, it is known as "C-Mail." Vodafone/Softbank phones use sky mail. Mobile e-mail is usually the norm when sending messages between phones with different services, but between phones using the same service, sending a text message ("tekisuto" in Japanese) is more prevalent. This is also because text messages are treated like fully-functional emails. Phones can receive text messages a la Blackberry technology, and send them out to any other phone or email account. Text messaging in Japan is much less expensive than talking on a mobile phone. Morse Code A few widely publicised speed contests have been held between expert Morse code operators and expert SMS users (see references). Morse code has consistently won the contests, leading to speculation that mobile phone manufacturers may eventually build a Morse code interface into mobile phones. The interface would automatically translate the Morse code input into text so that it could be sent to any SMS-capable mobile phone and the receiver of the message need not know Morse code to read it. Other speculated applications include taking an existing assistive application of Morse code and using the vibrating alert feature on the mobile lphone to translate short messages to Morse code for silent, hands-free "reading" of the incoming messages. Several mobile phones already have informative audible Morse code ring tones and alert messages. For example, many Nokia mobile phones have an option to beep "S M S" in Morse code when it receives a short message. There are third-party applications already available for some mobile phones that allow Morse input for short messages (see references). Spam An increasing trend towards spamming mobile phone users through SMS has prompted cellular service carriers to take steps against the practice, before it becomes a widespread problem. No major spamming incidents involving SMS had been reported as of October 2003, but the existence of mobile-phone spam has already been noted by industry watchdogs, including Consumer Reports magazine. Utility SMS has also given people instant access to a wealth of information. Services like 82ASK and Any Question Answered in the UK have used the SMS model to enable rapid response to mobile consumers' questions, using on-call teams of experts and researchers. Text speak
Social impact of SMS SMS has caused subtle but interesting changes in society and language since it became popular. News-worthy events include (in chronological order): Academic impact Criminal impact Political impact Social development Vulnerabilities See also | |||||||||||
|
| ||||||||||||
 |
|
| |