To Hell with SMS Plans

Carriers’ text (SMS) messaging plans should be one of the most contested issues with technology consumers have today, but aside from a few loud shouts from the corners of the Internet, they don’t receive as much attention as is deserved. What’s even more disconcerting than charging for text messages is the tiered pricing levels at which you must choose your service. But as horrible as SMS plans and pricing are, there is a greater problem lurking behind the veil of revolution: fragmentation. 

Context for Complaining

Back in 2007, AT&T allowed its network users to select from three tiered pricing structures for text message plans: 200/mo., 1500/mo., or unlimited. While the bottom tier has morphed over the years, there has always been a cheaper, more affordable option. The original pricing structure for the above tiers, circa five years ago, was:

• $5/200
• $15/1500
• $20/unlimited

Since Apple released its latest iOS version in 2011 (which included iMessage, a service that uses data bandwidth instead of cellular bandwidth to facilitate rich text messages to other iPhones/iOS/Mac users), AT&T eliminated the cheapest version. They also instituted a raise in price of the per-text message option to $0.20/message. While this it entirely unreasonable for a telecommunications/utility company to brace itself for a disruptive technology like iMessage, it’s also monstrously demonstrative of unwarranted price gouging. There is no doubt that SMS is a valuable, globalized technological standard that allows any mobile device with phone calablities to communicate cross-telco. But when you break down the data bandwidths and technology required to operate this, the pricing structure doesn’t match up. And in the face of easier, better messaging technologies that leverage speedy data pipes (let’s not forget BlackBerry Messenger, Google Voice, etc.), it becomes less forgivable to rely on older tech — and charge more for it. It’s not as if cellular bandwidth is a scarce resource; I’d wager more people are using fewer minutes on their monthly plans. And let’s be realistic: text messages are not inelastic. Or are they? 

The Numbers

Now, to put some context around this. Below is a snapshot of my text message usage since iMessage was released. 

My messaging habits didn’t change after October, so the gradual decline of message usage directly correlates to the migration of messaging people with SMS to iMessage. Obviously this migration requires the majority of your closest contacts to have iOS devices (in my case: true), but it’s still a remarkable juxtaposition. 

The Bigger Problem

Alas, SMS messaging (and its pricing model) isn’t going anywhere fast — except perhaps up in price. If anything, the introduction of iMessage, as seamless as its integration has been, will only fuel fragmentation among text message users. Those users also must continue to rely on SMS plans for iOS users to affordably message non-iOS users. 

Unless there is a grand messaging unification among mobile OS providers, or SMS technology gets an upgrade to data pipes instead of cellular ones, SMS will never go away. Instead, users will operate in silos whereby it benefits them to share the same mobile OS among families and friends to save money. For example, you could save quite a bit of money if you had an iPod Touch with a monthly data plan. You could leverage iMessage for text messages and a Skype number for voice calls (or undoubtably a soon-to-be-released Apple solution to voice over data), and eschew the constraints of cellular plan pricing from the carriers. As I’ve mentioned before, I could make a pretty penny if there was a black market for AT&T rollover minutes. 

Where My Complaint Is Valid

Regardless of the fragmentation, I still want to complain that the current SMS plans are gouging users. Half the point of iMessage was likely to reduce the monthly cost of SMS plans for iOS users (the other half being an improved experience with message synching across iOS devices, read receipts, etc.). That pricing benefit was rendered irrelevant when AT&T decided to amputate the affordable plan. Make no mistake, this was directly aimed to fuck over its own customers from saving $5-10 a month. I was planning on switching to the cheaper plan until they decided to play this damaging game. 

You’d think competition in this space would address the market’s need. I’m still waiting.  

Gave Studio Neat’s new Frameographer app a whirl while in Florida earlier this month. Set to ten second intervals.

Matter →

Backed. This is the kind of project Kickstarter was meant to deliver.

It should also go without saying that you ought to back Tim Schafer’s new Double Fine game, too.

Buster App Review

App Store - $1.99

As of 02.20.2012

Buster App in Action

Underrated, Overused

One of the most outstanding achievements in technology has been the implementation of public transportation tracking, and its availability to the public via the Internet. Apparently vehicle tracking systems these days typically use GPS or GLONASS technology for locating the vehicle as it traverses terrain. I have no idea what Chicago’s CTA buses and trains use, but I sure appreciate that they’ve implemented it over the past several years. Even though they don’t have displays at all of their bus/train stops, the CTA website performs fantastically well (and accurately) as an estimation tool for when to expect arrivals and transfers.

While the site works on mobile browsers, it isn’t design as elegantly as it ought to be. Touch targets are designed for some backasswards pre-2007 mobile phone browser, and there is no way to quickly access commonly frequented routes (unless you were to bookmark the starting point of each one). We must then let expect the digital marketplace to provide a better solution.

Enter Buster App

And the marketplace did answer.

While Buster app isn’t the only CTA app available on the App Store, it’s by far the best. You could argue it’s merely a glorified skin for the CTA mobile websites for tracking buses and trains, but you’d be wrong. It’s a clever integration of the data available through CTA’s bus/train tracking systems and the conveniences therein of an app that allows for the following perks:

• Saving favorites
• Identifying nearby stops for quick access
• Easy switching between cardinal directions at a selected stop
• Checking time estimates between transfers (i.e., you’re tracking one bus and checking when that bus will arrive at another stop to transfer buses)
• Sort by route or name
• Notifications for next bus arrivals

These are useful, convenient features that accelerate your accessibility of CTA times and ensures your trips along the oftentimes unreliable CTA are maximized.

Well Designed

The design considerations for Buster follow Apple’s Human User Guidelines to a T. Tabular navigation at the bottom of the screen, status bar visible at the top (useful for keeping an eye on the time as you browse), correctly sized tap targets, considerations for the high resolution displays, and neat use of location services for finding nearby bus stops. The contextual tabs at the top (switching between Sort by Bus/Sort by Name, for instance) and contextual back buttons (for instance:

And as a utility app, Buster deserves homepage placement. If I’m going anywhere other than downtown Chicago for work, this thing is tapped constantly. I’ll easily plot a route and maintain my expectations with exacting precision. If we weren’t so desensitized with the incredible feats of technology, the experience of using Buster would feel very much like precognition.

…the web is now largely filters on top of filters on top of filters

— 5 Minutes with Kottke

Saddleback Leather

A recent discovery, Saddleback Leather is a serious online retailer specializing in leather goods. They sell geniune, 100% leather goods across several accessory lines, including wallets, business bags, luggage, and belts. The warranty for their products also happens to be 100 years. Yeah, no shit. Fortunately, the seriousness ends with their products, and everything else is military-grade wit. Nothing beats a good copywriter.

So I recently placed an order for a fairly inexpensive wallet — an extremely simple thing, featuring one slot that holds around 8 cards (when jammed tightly in), and provides a finger hole at the bottom for popping up and extracting. As any good retailer, these fellows have a friendly Common Questions tab for each of their products. An important question of moral integrity regarding the leather’s origin receives an excellent response:

Are the animals tortured before they are slaughtered?

Absolutely not! With some pigs we do use waterboarding and sensory deprivation techniques previous to slaughtering them, but the cows do not require any special handling.

How you can not support a place like this? The whole site is a delight to read. When I actually received my wallet, tucked between the leather was a small business card of the company CEO with the tagline of “They’ll fight over it when you’re dead.” More, please.

The Classics Unearthed (Taken with instagram)

iPod Touch & the Mobile Market

For all of those seemingly astonished analysts (via 512 Pixels) mulling over the fact that Apple owns the mobile marketplace (even after the rise of Android OS’s footprint): how did you not see this coming? Not only does iOS still rake in the largest share of all mobile app purchases, but let’s not forget they also sell and rent movies and TV shows, and are still the number one retailer for music.

But while everyone talks iPhones and iPads, there’s a sneaky product that’s probably contributing to these numbers a hell of a lot more than most people would guess. One look around the families gathered at our Christmas tree this year and it’s evident that iPod touches are selling very well to the younger (and teenage) crowd. Almost all of my cousins currently owned one or received one for Christmas — and every single one of them received iTunes gift cards to spend on Apple’s digital stores. While setting these things up is a bit tedious (I helped two younger cousins get through the process of creating email accounts and Apple IDs), once everything is operational, it’s clear that kids grasp digital frameworks quickly — just hearing them discuss games and apps, how important reviews are, and maximizing the credit attributed to their accounts is explanatory enough to reinforce this. It’s also obvious, as a result, that Apple and its developers are making a significant amount of revenue from customers without credit cards tied to Apple IDs and gift cards. It’s a fantastic method for permitting young customers to access and purchase on a mobile marketplace without the need of a credit card.

The bigger problem for the marketplace is that, after five years, there is hardly any competitor to the iPod touch (or phone-less smartphone). And just like Apple dominates the so-called “tablet” market, they too dominate a market without valid competition: the phone-less smartphone market (which isn’t really a phone-less market when you factor in phone-enabling apps over wifi like Skype and Google Voice). If no one can manufacture a version of a smartphone without subsidies, then the marketplace really does belong to Apple. Apparently some have tried, but none have succeeded in denting marketshare. It’s certainly worse than the digital music player market that Apple nearly owned entirely with its iPods during the 2000s. And just like that market, they’re doing the same to the tablet and smartphone-less ones. Good luck to anyone who can marshall the financing and resources to take on these markets. At this point, though, it’d be wiser to carve a niche into somethign new.