The Death of SMS? Maybe So With Mountain Lion

2/20/2012

When Apple introduced iMessaging last year as part of iOS 5, there was talk that it could have an impact on texting?the ubiquitous mobile-to-mobile form, that is. If this had been any other platform besides iOS 5, or any other provider besides Apple, the talk would have been laughable. After all, texting? Statistics by comScore Mobile Metrix show that some 70% of U.S. mobile subscribers use text messaging on their mobile device.

A New Wrinkle

iMessaging, though, was a new wrinkle to a channel that has?as Pew has found in a separate set of statistics?stabilized, as in no more huge leaps in growth.

The next stage for texting may even be, hard as it is to grasp right now, a state of decline.

Earlier this year, the New York Times? Bits blog looked at this issue and found that, yes, texting might very well be in trouble one day.

It pointed to a post by iOS app developer Neven Mrgan, who collected data on his texting use before and after the iOS 5 launch.? There was a noticeable decline, Mrgan said in his post.

Bits? conclusion was that even though the number of text messages sent by cellphone customers in the United States is still growing, that growth is slowing and will likely taper off. In addition, ?countries like Finland and Hong Kong are already seeing serious shifts in the number of text messages their cellphone customers send.?

Mountain Lion Steps It Up

Now we have?or will have this summer?Apple?s OS X Mountain Lion, whose Messages feature, Gizmodo argues, will be the future of instant messaging. ?You can start a FaceTime conversation using the same program you use for AIM. Or Google Talk. Or Jabber. Want to text your friends, and you?re sitting at your laptop? No need to pick up your phone?just use Messages and send unlimited iMessages, just like you would on your handset.?

SMS interactions are logged separately, though, Gizmodo said. ?Every communication but SMS lands in one place.? Those few friends or family still clinging to their feature phones? ?With Messages, communication with them is going to be off on its own island,? Gizmodo concludes.

Other Providers Too

It?s not just Apple taking aim at SMS. Microsoft?s acquisition of Skype and GroupMe will likely spawn a similar service. And rumors are always afloat about a new Google service that will go beyond Google Talk and other IM apps.

In this context, last year?s Pew Internet survey about texting seems, in retrospect, like one giant nail in SMS? coffin.

It found that both text messaging and phone calling on cell phones have leveled off for the adult population as a whole. Not to misstate texting?s popularity: text messaging users send or receive an average of 41.5 messages on a typical day, with the median user sending or receiving 10 texts daily. However, these figures are largely unchanged from 2010.

Study author Aaron Smith told Wired News at the time that he thinks that people have just found their natural level of texting. ?For those already texting a lot (some users text upwards of 3,000 messages a month), there?s only so much you can increase from there,? he said.

The BlackBerry Argument

Companies that would hate to see SMS disappear or dwindle in use?a group that first and foremost consists of all telecom providers selling these services at a fabulous mark up?no doubt are taking comfort from RIM?s history with Blackberry Messenger. It has been around for ten or more years, and yet even when the BlackBerry was a coveted mobile platform, people were still sending texts to non RIM users.

But the mobile market has, to say the least, changed dramatically in the last ten years. The Blackberry Messenger argument, for a lot of reasons, is no longer a sure thing.

New Ways to Use Text

Not that companies are giving up on SMS services. Some companies, like retail REIT DDR, are dressing up the plain vanilla text with, for example, location-based offers. Last December it launched ValuText, which sends offers from retailers within a designated shopping center via text message to opted-in shoppers.

These and other efforts will keep the technology going for some time even if (as?) Messages eats into its market share.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikamorphy/2012/02/20/the-death-of-sms-maybe-so-with-mountain-lion/

Source: http://www.pmflegal.com/blog/index.php/2012/02/21/the-death-of-sms-maybe-so-with-mountain-lion/

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