WhatsApp: the SMS-killer?
There’s a lot to love about smartphones; always-on internet, browsing, chat, social networking, calendaring, reading and on and on. Although smartphones now mark the current pinnacle of mobile technology, there is still one of their features that remains firmly in the past: SMS.
The short messaging service is without a doubt one of the great contributions by mobile makers to the way we live our lives today. Without it many of us would be hamstrung. How else do you tell someone you’re running late; that you’re ready to be fetched; or (the perennial favourite) tell your boss you’re too sick to make it to work – all without having to make a call?
As useful as the SMS is, it is little more more than institutionalised robbery. At a time when we have high-speed mobile broadband it’s anathema to be paying anywhere between 20c and 60c to send a message, which is just a couple of kilobytes in size. Enter WhatsApp, a long-overdue alternative to SMS that could well mark the start of the decline of the SMS.
WhatsApp is by no means revolutionary. It uses the data connection on a smartphone to route SMS-like messages to other WhatsApp users, but instead of paying through your teeth for the network provider to route the message, WhatsApp routes it over the internet. What’s the cost of sending a 1kb packet over your data connection? It depends on your data bundle but it is, without a doubt, going to be exponentially cheaper than what your network provider is going to charge you to send an SMS.
In many ways WhatsApp is similar to the very popular Blackberry Messenger service.
Besides the obvious cost savings of using WhatsApp, the messaging service also has additional features that make it more appealing than SMS. For example, users can set a status message that tells users whether they are available or not, which is handy for telling contacts that you’re about to hop on a plane so probably won’t be replying for a couple of hours.
WhatsApp is also pretty easy to use and when it is first installed it scans your contacts to see which of them are already using WhatsApp. WhatsApp also uses your existing mobile phone number so you don’t end up with obscure user names that you need to remember. Sending a message is done exactly the same way as sending a traditional SMS.
The one drawback to WhatsApp is that not everyone is using it; unlike SMS which everyone with a cellular phone has access to. Instant messaging via smartphones is still a new concept for the majority of cellular users, but when it catches on, it could spell the end for the expensive SMS.
WhatsApp: the SMS-killer << Comments and views
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