Comments on: The iPhone – almost perfect http://www.rinzai.com/2007/01/12/the-iphone-almost-perfect/ a site for raven zachary Wed, 18 Jun 2008 13:56:49 -0400 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Raven Zachary http://www.rinzai.com/2007/01/12/the-iphone-almost-perfect/comment-page-1/#comment-3097 Raven Zachary Mon, 15 Jan 2007 09:28:35 +0000 http://www.rinzai.com/2007/01/12/the-iphone-almost-perfect/#comment-3097 Good point. The problem for me is convenience. I IM dozens of co-workers and only a handful of those people have any level of comfort with SMS. Using SMS as a replacement for IM won't work for me. Good point. The problem for me is convenience. I IM dozens of co-workers and only a handful of those people have any level of comfort with SMS. Using SMS as a replacement for IM won’t work for me.

]]> By: Blake Brannon http://www.rinzai.com/2007/01/12/the-iphone-almost-perfect/comment-page-1/#comment-3047 Blake Brannon Sun, 14 Jan 2007 22:58:37 +0000 http://www.rinzai.com/2007/01/12/the-iphone-almost-perfect/#comment-3047 Thoughts about SMS, I can see why Cingular would have a huge problem with the iPhone having IP based IM service via iChat. From my perspective, it all boils down to money. Just think about it. Using iChat IM would send messages over the data subscription service which for the iPhone would be $39.99 a month for unlimited usage. So Cingular would handle all those IM messages for one price. For the most part, IM people would primarily connect you to traditional computers on non-cellular networks. Using SMS opens your receiving community to almost every single cell phone user which is by far more people than those with IM accounts. Depending on the network and a particular plan, you could be paying say on average 5 cents per SMS message sent and the recipient 5 cents to receiver. So it cost 10 cents on average to communicate a single message over SMS. Now, think about the average IM message. Although SMS allows up to around 250 characters per message, most messages only include less than 5 words. Carrying on a small conversation can quickly reach say 20 exchanged messages. (This may not be typically for the interfaces available on most cellphones but with something like the iPhone's iChat UI, it will become more common). So just carrying on a single conversation that took a few minutes just made Cingular $2. Twenty of those a month and it has quickly surpassed the revenue gained from the unlimited data package. Thoughts about SMS,

I can see why Cingular would have a huge problem with the iPhone having IP based IM service via iChat. From my perspective, it all boils down to money. Just think about it. Using iChat IM would send messages over the data subscription service which for the iPhone would be $39.99 a month for unlimited usage. So Cingular would handle all those IM messages for one price. For the most part, IM people would primarily connect you to traditional computers on non-cellular networks.

Using SMS opens your receiving community to almost every single cell phone user which is by far more people than those with IM accounts. Depending on the network and a particular plan, you could be paying say on average 5 cents per SMS message sent and the recipient 5 cents to receiver. So it cost 10 cents on average to communicate a single message over SMS.

Now, think about the average IM message. Although SMS allows up to around 250 characters per message, most messages only include less than 5 words. Carrying on a small conversation can quickly reach say 20 exchanged messages. (This may not be typically for the interfaces available on most cellphones but with something like the iPhone’s iChat UI, it will become more common). So just carrying on a single conversation that took a few minutes just made Cingular $2. Twenty of those a month and it has quickly surpassed the revenue gained from the unlimited data package.

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