[IP] more on Verizon's Voice Mailboxes Now Give 'Shout Out' to Verizon Wireless Phones When New Messages Arrive
Begin forwarded message:
From: "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: June 10, 2005 2:13:24 PM EDT
To: dave@xxxxxxxxxx
Cc: "Patrick W. Gilmore" <patrick@xxxxxxxxx>
Subject: Re: [IP] more on Verizon's Voice Mailboxes Now Give 'Shout
Out' to Verizon Wireless Phones When New Messages Arrive
On Jun 10, 2005, at 2:04 PM, David Farber wrote:
Verizon and VZW are fundamentally separate companies with separate
infrastructure, selling to different audiences. *I* can't get Verizon
home service, for example, even though I could get a VZW phone.
VZW thinks that text messages are worth a lot of money, instead of
realizing that they are a nice way to get a little extra revenue from
an otherwise underutilized network.
They probably also still think that digital watches are a pretty
cool idea.
I suspect that making this happen involved a lot of negotiation
around how much accounting to do between the corporate entities,
and just how complicated it was to change the billing system to
manage it.
Possibly. But Verizon home could have offered it without any
negotiation a long time ago, and not just to VZ mobile phones. You
might have to pay for an incoming SMS, but lots of people would
happily pay for the service.
For a few bucks a month, I get a "find-me" number which SMSes me when
someone calls, their number, their name, and even their city. It
also e-mails the voicemails to me, takes faxes & e-mails me PDFs,
gives me a toll-free number, etc., etc.
This is all trivial to do. Some people do it themselves with a $500
PC and free software. The fact that Verizon as a company took so
long to do it speaks volumes for the telecommunications industry.
--
TTFN,
patrick
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