Two way Texting on Telecom

Forums › Spark New Zealand › Two way Texting on Telecom

Jama

1420 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Topic # 6241 10-Jan-2006 10:10

International text messages are still 20 cents. I thought it might be helpful to put together a list:

1. All these countries are two way (some are carrier specific)
Algeria
Australia (except Virgin)
Bangladesh (Sheba only)
Brunei
Cambodia (Samart and Shinawatra only)
Canada (Rogers AT&T, Telus and Bell only)
Central African Republic (Telecel and Atlantique only)
Cook Islands
Ecuador (Alegro PCS and Porta only)
Fiji
Guam
Hong Kong
India (Reliance only)
Iraq (Orascom only)
Japan (Tomen only)
South Korea (SKT)
Liberia (Libercell)
Malawi
Malaysia (Celcom)
Maldives (Wataniya)
Mexico
Oman (Nawras only)
Pakistan
Philippines (Globe and Digital only)
Saipan
Samoa
Saudi Arabia
Seychelles
Singapore
Syria
Thailand
Tonga
UK (O2 and T-Mobile only)
USA (AT&T, AllTel, Cingular, Nextel, Sprint and Verizon only)
Vietnam

2. There are another 100 (or so) countries that are 'One Way With Reply Path'. This means you can send a message but the recipient must reply within 2 days. After that the reply path is closed. In these countries the user can not send you a message out of the blue.

tonyhughes

Hawkes Bay
8477 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 4

Mod Emeritus

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

Reply # 26027 10-Jan-2006 10:20

Genuinely interested in the following if you can shed some light:

With the reply path, where is that info stored?

Why does it close after two days?

Is there any valid technical reason why the path closes after two days?
(or is it a commercial/cost decision)

Is it exactly 48 hours from receipt of the message through the system that holds the path?

cokemaster

Nate wants an iphone
3901 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 28

Mod Emeritus

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

Reply # 26047 10-Jan-2006 13:25

Disenchanted, nice sig.

Its good to see the list increasing. I'm personally looking forward to when or if China is added (China mobile preferably but China Unicom gsm/cdma is fine).

Don't really want to go off topic but in regard to roaming - is AU the only place where you have Data/SMS/Phone functions while roaming? I was under the understanding that all other places pretty much just have phone access and CSD.

webhosting |New Zealand connections | geekzone IRC chat
Loose lips may sink ships - Be smart - Don't post internal/commercially sensitive or confidential information!

Jama

1420 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Reply # 26053 10-Jan-2006 14:08

China Unicom is one way with reply path.

Yes - AU is the only place with complete roaming. Other countries will happen though. There is now a lot of focus in the CDMA community to sort it out.

Twitter - GaryRo

essamessa

12 posts

Geek

Reply # 26063 10-Jan-2006 16:26

Telecom has an agreement with the mobile messaging partner Mobile 365, which provides the interoperability required to enable operators across the globe, using all sorts of technologies and platforms, to exchange SMS and other forms of messaging.

Mobile 365 are responsible for managing the reply path options. The two day limit is no doubt a practical limitation due to the enormous volumes of traffic they handle - over 2 billion a month.

Pretty sure the two days is observed to the minute.

sbiddle

27065 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 6508

Moderator

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

Reply # 26070 10-Jan-2006 18:48

I would love to see Telecom impliment international MMS before Vodafone!

(I hardly count Vodafone Australia as "international" since they share the same platform)

paradoxsm

3000 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Reply # 26079 10-Jan-2006 21:19

Is that the old "inphomatch" the contract with Inphomatch also meant they had to remove international SMS from $10TXT as costs were greater than incoming revenue.

I heard there is a lot of arranging to make Usim or at least phones being able to be connected with other providers away from home, kinda a standards thing, like GSM. I can't wait for that day as ANY handset will be connectable to Telecom.

ricnz

5 posts

Wannabe Geek

Reply # 27299 27-Jan-2006 08:31

Hi cokemaster, Telecom now also has 2-way with both China Unicom and China Mobile.

Happy International testing!

cokemaster

Nate wants an iphone
3901 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 28

Mod Emeritus

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

Reply # 27328 27-Jan-2006 14:19

Cool.
My family have a few 027 handsets so I'll try it out and see how it goes. :)

I hope its not like Voda-Chinamobile where you can text from Chinamobile to Vodafone NZ but not the other way around. (haven't tried since last year)

When I queried both Vodafone blames Chinamobile. Chinamobile blames Vodafone.

webhosting |New Zealand connections | geekzone IRC chat
Loose lips may sink ships - Be smart - Don't post internal/commercially sensitive or confidential information!