Voice/Text Messages
I want to be able to leave "voice" text messages. Text messages themselves aren't for me. Aside from the $.20 per message cost (!), it's always struck me as being an inefficient means of communications.
What's with the $.20 price tag, anyways?! Sending a text message has to cost the mobile network next to nothing. What we've been taught growing up is that in the USA capitalism reigns, and in this case a competitor should arise that will offer cheaper text messages. But I claim that's can't happen here, due to monopolies and collusion amongst the mobile carriers. The only hope I hold for this is with the FCC's auction of airwaves and the fact that they will be requiring some amount of openness to them. But I digress... I can have a full rant about this issue at another time.
Going back to my original point, I don't see text messages as very efficient. I do have a smart phone (Palm Treo), so writing a text message isn't much harder than writing an email, but I find voice communication to still be much better. So what's the reason for world-wide fervor surrounding text messages? I can think of two reasons:
1) They are a silent form of communication
2) They offer a way of fast, one-way communication
I won't argue with reason #1. There are times, like in meetings/class/clubs/etc, where talking into a phone is either undesirable or not possible.
But for reason #2, I would like to there to be a way to leave a voice message instead of a text message. Currently, to leave a voice message for someone, I have to either wait for a bunch of rings + the outgoing message (with a sizable potential of the recipient answering his/her cell phone instead), or I have to go through my voice message box, and leave a message via some menu option (and this only works if I want to leave a message for someone on my own network).
Why can't I just hit some button on my phone, record a short message, and then have that message deposited in some inbox of sorts for another person? Furthermore, why can't that other person then look into their inbox in much the same way as looking through a list of received text messages? They would be able to, with one or two button presses, listen to a message when they choose to. I've heard the iPhone can do as much for voicemail messages; this would be similar, I guess.
I can also imagine an interface that effectively merges push-to-talk with this concept. This is similar to what I've described above, except it'd be more instantaneous and you wouldn't be able to re-record your message.
Okay, that's my rant/request. Maybe I'll expound upon it later...
- Mike
What's with the $.20 price tag, anyways?! Sending a text message has to cost the mobile network next to nothing. What we've been taught growing up is that in the USA capitalism reigns, and in this case a competitor should arise that will offer cheaper text messages. But I claim that's can't happen here, due to monopolies and collusion amongst the mobile carriers. The only hope I hold for this is with the FCC's auction of airwaves and the fact that they will be requiring some amount of openness to them. But I digress... I can have a full rant about this issue at another time.
Going back to my original point, I don't see text messages as very efficient. I do have a smart phone (Palm Treo), so writing a text message isn't much harder than writing an email, but I find voice communication to still be much better. So what's the reason for world-wide fervor surrounding text messages? I can think of two reasons:
1) They are a silent form of communication
2) They offer a way of fast, one-way communication
I won't argue with reason #1. There are times, like in meetings/class/clubs/etc, where talking into a phone is either undesirable or not possible.
But for reason #2, I would like to there to be a way to leave a voice message instead of a text message. Currently, to leave a voice message for someone, I have to either wait for a bunch of rings + the outgoing message (with a sizable potential of the recipient answering his/her cell phone instead), or I have to go through my voice message box, and leave a message via some menu option (and this only works if I want to leave a message for someone on my own network).
Why can't I just hit some button on my phone, record a short message, and then have that message deposited in some inbox of sorts for another person? Furthermore, why can't that other person then look into their inbox in much the same way as looking through a list of received text messages? They would be able to, with one or two button presses, listen to a message when they choose to. I've heard the iPhone can do as much for voicemail messages; this would be similar, I guess.
I can also imagine an interface that effectively merges push-to-talk with this concept. This is similar to what I've described above, except it'd be more instantaneous and you wouldn't be able to re-record your message.
Okay, that's my rant/request. Maybe I'll expound upon it later...
- Mike
posted by Michael at 3:09 PM
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