I’ve been testing out a new service called FSMS, which is essentially a website that gives you the tools to send free text messages.
Signing up for an account is quick, enter in your person details and wait for a validation code, which arrives on your mobile device. Upon entering in your validation code, you’ll be logged into the system and given several options:
- New SMS
- Contact Manager
- Inbox
- Outbox
- Profile
All of these are obvious, but they’re pretty cool, the contact manager allows you to quickly and easily add your friends and their mobile numbers, you can then sms them, update their details or remove them.
Obviously I wanted to test it out, so I quickly entered in a mobile number, typed out a message and clicked send – The website confirmed the sending of the text message and a few seconds later I received it. This is where I saw the first bad thing, the message doesn’t arrive from your number:
To be honest, this is where I would normally kill my account and move on, what’s worse than not having the messages delivered from your own number – this is a step back in time if you ask me, services like this have been around for years already, so I was a bit let down.’
The second obvious thing is that you only get 10 sms’s per day, which means that there will soon be a paid-for solution, requiring you to buy credits – Sounds very much like a skin for Clickatell or BulkSMS doesn’t it?
I’m hoping that the Web AddiCT(s); will check this out, because they really know what’s cutting in the free sms realm, let’s see if they’ll pop us a comment here and let us know wasup.
If you’re still interested in this service, click here.
My opinion: Skip this one for the time being.
They been online a few months already, checked it out when they launched, back then you got unlimited messages. They have redesigned their site in the meantime and now the limit.
The problem with the from number is likely due to their bulk SMS provider. From numbers needs to be requested and approved before you can use them in your messages.
Chris, have to agree with you. My next worry is what are they going to do with my cellnumber and if they do not use it for the from why do I need to give it to them when I register. Will not be surprised if I soon get spammed.
@Gerhard – Thanks for coming in and updating us, appreciate. Ye, assumed it was their sms provider that resulted in the fixed delivery numbers.
@Marius – Must admit, when I signed up, I worried about that too, I’ve signed up and the MINUTE I get spammed, I’ll blog it :)
I signed up but all seemed a bit dodge, I then checked out the T&Cs (I never do) and found this:
“1.2 You should be aware that: (a) We may wish to send you further offers or information by mailshot, SMS text, WAP Push, email or telephone. We may want to pass your contact details to carefully selected companies both within and outside the South African Economic Area who may want to send you offers and information which may be of interest to you.”
There is an out though, but honestly who is going to be reading the T&Cs…
“If you wish not to receive these please use the mechanisms provided on the website; such as, to e-mail us at info@fsms.co.za.”
Thanks for evaluating our service, Chris. We are aware of some of the current limitations on the site and are working daily to improve the
service.
One thing I would like to mention is that it is a *two-way* service – the numbers have to be generated at random so that if a user replies it will appear in your inbox on the website. You can thus receive replies even if you have no reception on your phone, or have left it at home, or for a plethora of other reasons.
The option of having the number appear from your cellphone is available to us – it is just that we would rather offer the above service, it was a difficult decision we had to make. Perhaps we will offer a choice in future.
We are working on increasing the limit of SMSes per day but we are still in the beta phase of our product development, the limit was set largely due to attempted abuse of the service – but as soon as we have the necessary statistics we will make the decision to up the figure.
Thanks again,
Daniel
Ye @Wezz, I spotted that too after taking a squiz, going to pop them an email, screenshot it and keep it handy :)
@Daniel – Thanks for coming through and giving us some more information about the service. Please understand that this is constructive critism and not a direct hit at you gents. The website is cool and if you can perfect the idea and NOT send out extra information, it could just work and become a handy tool for most of us web junkies – especially if you evolved into creating a Firefox addon or something for quick texting!
The word “FREE” has a whole new meaning in the cyber world. It is just a draw card that is used. Somewhere along the way your credit card will have to be used.
@Ashley – I agree and disagree with you. I think all in all, most services will either recoup costs through sending texts or emails out to subscribed users to make money back in advertising, or they’ll soon offer a premium service which normally makes it pointless staying on the free package (some services get this right, last.fm for example charged a really small monthly amount and that worked). On the other hand, at this point, this service is free, I signed up free and sent a few text messages for free and sent an email opting out of any further corresspondence from them – so it’s free at the moment, if you know what I mean..
Hi Chris,
Just an update, we’ve upped the limit to 20 messages per day for now – hopefully that helps :)
Kind regards,
Daniel
Thanks for keeping us posted Daniel, please don’t hesitate to drop a comment in here from time to time so we can keep this nice and updated.
I think the increase to 20 is a great move, it’s what Vodacom4me offer :)
was just wondering whether it would be possible to put a name (personal, nickname or even business name) instead of the random from/reply number. personally if i receive a message from a person i know but its comming from a strange number i might not believe the message was from them. just a suggestion. im not even sure if a name is possible. it should be though. anything is possible these days.
Do you know of any free sms services to send sms to Turkey? I found your discussion very informative – Thanks