There are two cool stories concerning good old, reliable SMS today. First of all, Swisscom will soon be introducing a “missed call” system, to notify you when someone you’ve tried to call is available. Second, North Korean koryolink is introducing free SMS for customers for the first time.
Swisscom’s new SMS service:
This new service will be coming into play on the 15th October. It’s built on an already existing service called COMBOX, which sends missed call notifications to your mobile… from your fixed line. It also allows you to access and listen to messages people leave on your fixed line phone.
So, the way this new service works is this: you call somebody, and they don’t answer. Maybe they’re on another call, or they’re out of coverage, or their battery is dead. Whatever the reason, COMBOX registers that you have called. When the person you missed becomes available again, COMBOX will send you an SMS letting you know. Basically, it cuts out the necessity to keep on ringing people to check if they’re available yet.
Naturally, it only works for Swisscom to Swisscom calls. It is free though, and both cancellation and re-regristation are free as well.
Free SMS comes to North Korea:
Back in January 2008, Egyptian-based operator Orascom was granted the license to create a 3G network in the Democratic People’s Republic of North Korea. It entered into a joint-venture with the state controlled Korea Post & Telecommunications Trading Corporation, and launched a mobile network called koryolink in December 2008.
It hasn’t been doing all that well.
As of June, it had a little under 50,000 subscribers to the network. It has not yet spread a fibre-optic cable network to the whole country, but it is working on it. So today, the network has announced that in order to attract more subscribers it will be reducing connection fees, and introducing the first free SMS seen in North Korea.
What we think?
I really, really like the Swisscom announcement. It’s got everything in it that I look for in a new mobiles service. Is it useful? Yes – I’m sure we’ve all encountered this particular problem from both ends. Having to ring someone five times during a day is annoying, as is realising your phone has been off and turning it back on to receive 15 missed calls. However, sometimes one turns ones phone off to get some privacy, and you might not want everyone to immediately ring you. Which leads to the second thing I looked for. Can it be turned off? Yes! And finally, is it free? Also yes. Good work, Swisscom.
As for North Korea – apparently this reduction in price is part of an overall plan to expand communication and improve flow of information throughout the country. I wouldn’t be so sure of that. This is the country that completely banned the use or carrying of mobile phones after an explosion in 2004. The reason mobiles were banned was so that people couldn’t spread the news of the explosion. That ban was lifted earlier this year, but how many 3G services does Orascom think it will be allowed to install? Nothing that allows a service like Twitter to be used will ever get near the Democratic People’s Republic.
