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New Wait, what?
You pay for incoming texts?

Dude.

Uncool.
New Yep, I used to ...
Switch to unlimited data and texts a long while back... Except after 6GB it is throttled.

Also only get 2100 minutes to share 'tween 5 phone and a dongle.
--
greg@gregfolkert.net
"No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible." --Stanislaw Jerzy Lec
New Not any more, but ...
I used to carry a company-issued pager. All of us got notifications whenever our code threw an error.

One day someone put an error in a tight loop and had notifications enabled from his dev environment. All our pagers started lighting up. It took over 30 seconds before one of us was able to open it and figure out where it was coming from. "CHRIS! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!?!?!?!" "Huh? Oh, is that me?"

We had to call AT&T and ask them to empty all 13 of our inboxes ... including any "real" messages caught in the crossfire. They ranged from 11k to over 17k per box. And we were supposed to be charged per message. The alternative to having them delete everything would have cost 5 figures.
--

Drew
New There are people who do here
and yeah, it's totally uncool. If you're on PAYG, you pay for incoming texts, or you pop up ten bucks a month for a texting plan.

Our regulatory agency on the telecoms here (the CRTC) used to be decent, but nowadays it's a prime example of regulatory capture in Canada: there's a revolving door between it and the executive level people in the telecoms.
New Refresh my memory
The reason texts are 140 characters is that's the amount of bandwidth available in the network ping, so it's essentially free (from a bandwidth perspective) for the telcos, right?
--

Drew
New No
SMS originated as a messaging protocol to carry debugging messages from devices that were being remotely debugged to make sure they worked properly on the cell network. It's a fixed length packet, with a 140 byte payload. You can get 160 characters in it when you use a 7bit char set specifically designed to work with SMS.

The engineers working on the devices wrote a little thing into the firmwares to be able to compose messages and send them to other devices, probably so they could troll each other, and the rest, as they say, is history.
New It's what happened because the US was late to GSM. :-)
I'm being only partly cynical. But I remember reading somewhere that when the US telcos looked at providing GSM, they noticed what features customers elsewhere in the world made popular and figured out ways to charge for them.

We don't pay in AU for incoming calls or texts, either.

Wade.
Just Add Story http://justaddstory.wordpress.com/
     Lumia 1020 ordered. - (pwhysall) - (27)
         Who cares about 41 MP? - (folkert) - (1)
             I do. - (pwhysall)
         Re: Lumia 1020 ordered. - (Bman) - (17)
             Re: Lumia 1020 ordered. - (pwhysall) - (16)
                 But you're can't join the collective that way! -NT - (Another Scott)
                 I has it. - (pwhysall) - (14)
                     we have an unlimited data plan as well - (boxley) - (13)
                         OK, I'm confused - (hnick) - (1)
                             Neither - (drook)
                         Interesting. - (pwhysall) - (10)
                             yes it counts, yes it sucks glad phones are tax deductable -NT - (boxley)
                             Ya think it's bad for them - (jake123) - (8)
                                 Nice... - (folkert) - (7)
                                     Wait, what? - (pwhysall) - (6)
                                         Yep, I used to ... - (folkert)
                                         Not any more, but ... - (drook)
                                         There are people who do here - (jake123) - (2)
                                             Refresh my memory - (drook) - (1)
                                                 No - (jake123)
                                         It's what happened because the US was late to GSM. :-) - (static)
         They've got great TV commercials here - (lincoln)
         Quick example or two - (pwhysall) - (5)
             322 kB jpeg. - (Another Scott) - (3)
                 Heh - (pwhysall) - (2)
                     Thanks. - (Another Scott) - (1)
                         Re: Thanks. - (pwhysall)
             More extensive blathering about the camera on G+ - (pwhysall)

Reillusionment... what a concept.
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