Google SMS Service Faces Problems
Written on Wednesday, February 04, 2009
SMS messages were being delivered in dozens to random users for no reason, and if you've never experienced such a problem, well let me tell you it is a right pain...
Having worked as a developer for SMS marketing tools in the past, I have, of course, at times used my own mobile as a testbed, and the first time you discover a bug that sends your mobile a couple of hundred SMS messages, you will remember for a while!
Regardless of the model, mobile phones are slow to process incoming messages. Even with the fastest of phones that I've used, the task of erasing large numbers of SMS in your inbox. Just have a go yourself! (And if you have a phone where this is quick, please, do share the model!! :) )
For more details about the Google SMS malfunction, have a read through the detailed report in this article. Here are some highlights:
At least over here we don't get charged for incoming SMS messages.. And it seems that moreover, this is not the only problem the service has faced:There are many complaints about the issue on the Google Mobile
Carriers were swamped with phone calls early that morning. Since many
homepage and within the company’s Help Forum. Of course, besides being
disruptive, many of the service’s users don’t have an unlimited text
message plan and were worried about being charged for the messages.
people using several carriers were experiencing the problem, it became
evident that Google was at fault.The Google SMS search users started to receive text messages every seven to 13 minutes, starting at about 2:30 a.m.
Users expressed anger, annoyance and frustration.
In
many of the threads, Google SMS users expressed that they would think
twice before they do a simple SMS weather check with Google.Google SMS provides mobile phone users information while on the go .
All users need to do is text message their search query to 466453 and Google texts back the results.
Even so, don't get me wrong.. The idea behind Google SMS is great, and I'm sure once all issues have been ironed out, it will be very useful indeed. It's just that all software, even that backed by Google, has bugs.. And I think it's worth putting up with a few minor annoyances, if it means getting a great service for free.Users who received SMS messages that night and don’t have an
unlimited text message plan may be able to work out the problem with
their carrier. Google is not planning on paying for these charges.
sent around 30 text messages to thousands of users. What this implies
is this: This isn’t the only problems that the Google SMS search
service has faced.On Jan. 8, the service stopped sending results back to users’ queries.
Then on Jan. 15, Google confirmed issues with queries via Google SMS related to sport scores. What's next?
Posted in
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Interesting. Google SMS, something like 'Search on demand' turned into 'Search by default' for a few moments.
I guess that's why every Google product is labeled as Beta. :P
Hi George,
Yeah, I have always wondered about what will become of that too.. I mean, I even know of a few companies that have based a lot of their infrastructure and daily tasks on Google's products and I can't say I'm convinced that Google won't exploit that for its own reasons one day.
Having said that, most of us are pretty dependent on Google Search anyway, so if Google changes policy, it's going to affect the whole world, and the way things happen online, so there'll be a lot more to worry about anyway.. :)
So are the results returned by the Google SMS query from the standard search engine results or from the paid AdWords?