from Hacker News

Howto add SMS functionality to your web app

by dimitry on 11/6/09, 8:49 PM with 24 comments

• by JustAGeek on 11/6/09, 11:00 PM

  Am I the only one considering it a bit dodgy that the headline of this submission sounds like this was eg a blog post describing how to add SMS but instead you get to a commercial site?

  I mean, I'd have nothing against this if the submitter had asked for feedback/review or simply had used a more honest title. :/

• by Zarathu on 11/6/09, 9:03 PM

  Wow! I really like this!

  It seems to be a simple, flexible version of TextMarks, without all the bullshit.

  [edit] Yeah, you should publish the prices on the page. It appears to be 5¢ per SMS, or $25 for 500.

• by uggedal on 11/6/09, 9:15 PM

  Is this US only? What is the pricing?

  The landing page or at least the "learn more" page should have answered these questions.

• by jsm386 on 11/6/09, 11:56 PM

  As other commenters noted, they are providing something that a lot of other companies provide, such as the company I work for, Ez Texting.

  Here's my plug: we can deliver to the US and Canada, our prices start @ 5 cents an SMS and go down from there, we've got a memorable short code (313131) and we already support a lot of people through our API. http://www.eztexting.com/api.html

• by kevinholesh on 11/6/09, 9:23 PM

  I knew you were from Pittsburgh as soon as I saw your name!

  Interesting product, but your "How it works" page would be more comprehensible with a diagram or a flow chart.

  This would be an excellent product if you need a short code, but $0.05 is a little steep for me. I'd rather use an email address (text@gumband.com for example) to send my SMS messages.

• by dimitry on 11/6/09, 8:50 PM

  Also, more about how it works: http://www.gumband.com/learnmore.php

• by atamyrat on 11/6/09, 10:23 PM

  With Gumband, your users send to the shared shortcode with your keyword, but if you want a dedicated/international incoming SMS number, I've been happy user of http://csoft.co.uk/ for about 2 years now.

• by nixme on 11/7/09, 1:13 AM

  Why do SMS web service prices vary so much? How does this service do a better job than Penny SMS who charge $0.01/message and provide return messages via email? https://www.pennysms.com/

• by petesalty on 11/6/09, 9:02 PM

  Apart from a nicer website, how is this service any different from Mobivity, or half a dozen others? Maybe it's substantially cheaper but I can't seem to find any pricing information.

• by psyklic on 11/6/09, 9:37 PM

  What if someone decides to spam you? Is there any way to enact daily limits or to block numbers?

• by pieter on 11/6/09, 9:04 PM

  Too bad they don't list any real pricing information. Also, what about non-US customers?

• by fjabre on 11/6/09, 10:09 PM

  Definitely cool but it would get expensive quickly.

• by cschep on 11/6/09, 9:46 PM

  aren't there email addresses for every common vendor?

  yournumber@att.net

  or something like that?