Text messaging with Cingular

Tell them not to text messages you or subscribe to text messages ($2.99 -100 msgs) ($5.99 -250 msgs) ($9.99 -500 msgs).

 

Dukedog --

You have to admit, though, that Anonymous makes a valid point -- why should Cingular charge for messages that are received? The number and size of messages that are sent to my phone are beyond my control. I know that Cingular isn't the only company to do this, but it just doesn't make sense to me. I would pay $$$ to send a message if I felt I needed to or if I had a really good reason to do so, but I had to disable the Interactive Messaging feature because I refuse to pay for SMS messages that I have no control over. I just think the method of charging for these text messages is ridiculous...

ATLguy

 

I have to agree with you guys. Why should I let senders dictate how much I pay for SMS? I like to have control of how much I spend on personal communications and I am sure all of you too. This morning I received two SMS in my Cingular phone from God knows who. One had a weird number on it (not a phone number) the other one said "Goku". That's 20 cents right there!

One thing we all have to be aware is just like companies got into the game of spamming our regular email addresses they can start doing the same for your cellphone email addresses and just the thought of it scares me. Slowly but at a constant pace SMS is becoming one more tool to suck the dollars out of your pocket. Everyday we see more and more websites that make use of SMS to send people messages and what would happen if all these SMS addresses fall into the hands of spammers? The first version of this is something we Cingular customers know called "My Wireless Window" which is only a portal full of garbage you can get anywhere for free designed to make Cingular richer by using the SMS capability.

I just tell people to be aware and not to get carried away by these new toys. They did not invent them so you can have more fun with them. They invented them so they can suck more dollars out of your pocket!

 

Isn't that one reason that Verizon took the issue to court? They were also charging for receiving messages and Verizon sees SMS, EMS and MMS as the wave of the future. But if spammers start unwanted messages, that just irritates everyone. Since spammers HAVE started this practice, it would only be responsible conduct on the part of the carriers to filter out this unwanted junk mail

Even though ATT does NOT charge for incoming messages, it is STILL annoying. Some spammer sent an email to my wife and carefully phrased it: "Have you gotten them yet?" But never indicated what "them" was, which would only invite a reply. I told my wife not to respond with even "wrong person" because that only gives the spammer a heads up that they contacted a valid address and then they turn around and sell that address.

The best action is to keep a log of these unwanted senders and notify the carrier. Another class-action suit can be initiated against these scum bags.

Speaking of scum, ever since my activities here, I had started receiving an increased number of malicious email with viruses attached. Good thing I've got more smarts than to open the attachments. If you use a valid address here, be very careful about attachments and emails from unknown sources. They have gotten so crafty that they represent themselves as being "webmaster@wirelessadvisor.com" or appear to be a rejection of an email you initiated. These scum are not even worthy of being called human.

When in doubt, check the "full headers" option on your email. You'll notice that it was most probably purposely altered to make it appear innocent.

 

All of SunCom's (Triton PCS) plans include text messaging (Receive only) for free and there is no cap on how many messages you can receive. Also there 2 way service known as "inotes" gives you the ability to send and receive as many text messages as you want for only $4.99 extra a month.

 

Blacklisting known spammers has been proven not to be effective. They still find ways to reach your inbox no matter how many filters you and your provider setup.

 

I agree with the "Anonymous" post above -- it would be a really nice feature if the wireless providers offered an unlimited SMS option for $5 or even $10 a month. I, for one, do not need that kind of functionality, but by offering an unlimited option, at least they would eliminate part of this whole SPAM debate. If you want to receive SMS/text/e-mail messages on your phone, you obviously have to make your phone's address available. Doing so ultimately provides your address to the SPAMers (damn, those guys are good ... so why not just accept that fact and provide an unlimited messaging feature for additional money each month? Seems logical to me.

ATLguy

 

Bobo,

I don't know what side of their brain these spammers are using. So they manage to get their message through...so what. Do they really think that irritating the potential buying market is a way to stimulate sales? I would make a real effort NOT to buy from these people, just to make the point that irritating me is no way to drum up business.

 

For these reasons, I don't even use my text messaging. I used it when I was on AT&T and it was fairly useful but not essential. With Verizon, I'm charged to send and recieve so I just don't use it. I've never even given out the addressto anyone. Hopefully I'll stay spam free. As far as laws, I hope a similar law is developed to the one that makes telemarketing to mobile phones illegal.

 

About spam and malicious e-mails--

Try signing up with sneakemail.com, they have a service where you can generate an unlimited number of e-mail address in the form of "[random alphanumeric string]@sneakemail.com", which then forward to whatever you set as your real e-mail address.

You can assign a single sneakemail address to any site or company that requires your address, so you 1) Know where your e-mail got harvest from, and 2) Can delete the afflicted sneakemail address if it gets too bad.

The service is free, but they do ask for donations. I've been using it for a while now, and it works pretty well.

-Guppy

 

I have been having to run away from my email accounts because over the months it becomes unbearable the amount of SPAM that I receive. I just change my email address. Of course that spamming my cell phone won't make me buy from those vendors, but they can runup my phone bill and since they don't pay my bill, I don't want them in my phone. Now it wouldn't be a bad idea if they payed my phone bill in exchange for receiving SMS spam. That would be a new business model like free internet used to be.