Skip to main content

Will SMS Applications Thrive?

Short Message Service (SMS) text messaging is now standard on mobile phones. (Multimedia Message Service, or MMS, is an enhanced messaging service that adds the ability to attach pictures and sounds to the messages you transmit.) It is widely used. But will it survive in anything resembling its current form?

I am a big fan of Google SMS. I was at Academy buying shoes on a Sunday evening and decided to go to Oshman's in the hope they would have a better selection. Would Oshman's be open on a Sunday evening? How could I obtain their phone number so I could call them? If I used my mobile phone's directory assistance service, it would cost me $1.25. I ended up using Google SMS to determine Oshman's phone number.

I wrote 'oshmans austin texas' in a text message and sent it to 46645 (GOOGL on most phones). Within seconds, I had received a text message back from Google SMS with the address and phone number of Oshman's. Very convenient! Yahoo has a similar service.

I can imagine many useful applications of this sort. There are many situations where we are on the go, need some information, but don't have access to it without calling someone to have them look it up. But I know of only two such services: Google SMS and Yahoo's similar service. And I don't know anyone else who has ever used them. Why haven't SMS applications taken off?

Comments

Brandon said…
I think dodgeball is pretty cool but only a few people are using it. May want to try it: http://austin.dodgeball.com/index.php
Roger L. Cauvin said…
Oh yeah, now I remember you and Cote mentioning Dodgeball about a month ago.

Popular posts from this blog

Why Spreadsheets Suck for Prioritizing

The Goal As a company executive, you want confidence that your product team (which includes all the people, from all departments, responsible for product success) has a sound basis for deciding which items are on the product roadmap. You also want confidence the team is prioritizing the items in a smart way. What Should We Prioritize? The items the team prioritizes could be features, user stories, epics, market problems, themes, or experiments. Melissa Perri  makes an excellent case for a " problem roadmap ", and, in general, I recommend focusing on the latter types of items. However, the topic of what types of items you should prioritize - and in what situations - is interesting and important but beyond the scope of this blog entry. A Sad but Familiar Story If there is significant controversy about priorities, then almost inevitably, a product manager or other member of the team decides to put together The Spreadsheet. I've done it. Some of the mos

Interaction Design: the Neglected Skill

Your product development organization has a big, gaping hole in it. (Be prepared to feel defensive as you continue reading.) One of the most important roles in product development is the role of interaction designer. An interaction designer designs how the users will interact with the product and conceptualize the tasks they perform. He decides whether, for example, the user interface will be command driven, object oriented (clicking on objects then specifying what to do with them), or wizard based. The interaction designer decides the individual steps in the use cases. Every company has one or more people that play the interaction designer role. Usually, those people have little or no expertise in interaction design. Sadly, they typically don't even realize how unqualified they are. Let's see who typically plays the role at companies. Engineer . An engineer is an expert on building what is designed. Yes, an engineer may know how to design the internal structure of the hardware

Stop Validating and Start Falsifying

The product management and startup worlds are buzzing about the importance of "validation". In this entry, I'll explain how this idea originated and why it's leading organizations astray. Why Validate? In lean startup circles, you constantly hear about "validated learning" and "validating" product ideas: The assumption is that you have a great product idea and seek validation from customers before expending vast resources to build and bring it to market. Indeed, it makes sense to transcend conventional approaches to making product decisions . Intuition, sales anecdotes, feature requests from customers, backward industry thinking, and spreadsheets don't form the basis for sound product decisions. Incorporating lean startup concepts , and a more scientific approach to learning markets, is undoubtedly a sounder approach. Moreover, in larger organizations, sometimes further in the product life-cycle, everyone seems to have an opinio