Comments on: SMS vs. IM (USA vs. Europe?) http://www.littlespringsdesign.com/blog/blog/2008/04/30/sms-vs-im-usa-vs-europe/ designing the mobile user experience Thu, 11 Mar 2010 18:55:46 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Barbara http://www.littlespringsdesign.com/blog/blog/2008/04/30/sms-vs-im-usa-vs-europe/comment-page-1/#comment-39102 Barbara Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:59:57 +0000 http://www.littlespringsdesign.com/blog/?p=409#comment-39102 I think that long distance was a commodity by the time mobile hit the stage in the U.S., and home computers with dial-up access were prevalent. So US users were accustomed to email and cheap voice ... and had to pay for incoming minutes. So they used their computers for text-like things and the home lines for voice - at least until voice minute costs came down. Then there was the coverage issue: the silly things had to work reliably. Too bad some of the US population and much of its land area doesn't have that. (side note: Russian operators covering 97% of their population hold me in awe, even if it is only 78% of the geography) European users were accustomed to expensive computer Internet access, so SMS (a throw-away product) was great. Japanese companies didn't implement SMS, and Japanese users had very little space in their lives for privacy and personalization (check out Japanese credit card designs if you disagree). Add to that a 1-2 hour train ride with no voice, and those nifty personal devices that iMode (designed as a stopgap until the network could be upgraded, and targeted at teenage girls) was the right product in the right context. Now European Internet access is roughly equivalent to U.S. access, but the phone saturation is higher. I think that long distance was a commodity by the time mobile hit the stage in the U.S., and home computers with dial-up access were prevalent. So US users were accustomed to email and cheap voice … and had to pay for incoming minutes. So they used their computers for text-like things and the home lines for voice – at least until voice minute costs came down. Then there was the coverage issue: the silly things had to work reliably. Too bad some of the US population and much of its land area doesn’t have that. (side note: Russian operators covering 97% of their population hold me in awe, even if it is only 78% of the geography)

European users were accustomed to expensive computer Internet access, so SMS (a throw-away product) was great.

Japanese companies didn’t implement SMS, and Japanese users had very little space in their lives for privacy and personalization (check out Japanese credit card designs if you disagree). Add to that a 1-2 hour train ride with no voice, and those nifty personal devices that iMode (designed as a stopgap until the network could be upgraded, and targeted at teenage girls) was the right product in the right context.

Now European Internet access is roughly equivalent to U.S. access, but the phone saturation is higher.

]]> By: Jason Sullivan http://www.littlespringsdesign.com/blog/blog/2008/04/30/sms-vs-im-usa-vs-europe/comment-page-1/#comment-39101 Jason Sullivan Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:19:02 +0000 http://www.littlespringsdesign.com/blog/?p=409#comment-39101 I'd thought long and hard about the different pricing structures for SMS in the US vs. The Rest of the Known World race, but I hadn't considered the driving aspect. Could the pricing be a result of the lesser desire due to driving? Or is the pricing an attempt to curb text messaging during driving? I’d thought long and hard about the different pricing structures for SMS in the US vs. The Rest of the Known World race, but I hadn’t considered the driving aspect. Could the pricing be a result of the lesser desire due to driving? Or is the pricing an attempt to curb text messaging during driving?

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