Twitter Halts UK SMS Service
The popular micro-blogging system Twitter has stopped its text message support in the UK due to excessive costs, leaving British users without a full service.
The Site, which allows users to send messages to individuals or friends over the web, text or instant messaging, will still continue to allow people to send messages to Twitter y mobile, but will no longer deliver updates and messages to people via SMS. The move does not affect the US, Canada or India.
In an email to users last night, Co-founder Biz Stone explained that the company could not afford to support outbound SMS until it had made better billing arrangements with Britain?s mobile phone operators.
“It pains us to take this measure. However, we need to avoid placing undue burden on our company and our service,” he said.
“Even with a limit of 250 messages received per week, it could cost Twitter about $1,000 per user, per year to send SMS outside of Canada, India, or the US. It makes more sense for us to establish fair billing arrangements with mobile operators than it does to pass these high fees on to our users.”
The announcement rubbed a large amount of UK users the wrong way, with one user saying that it was ?too much of a downgrade,? but in the same breadth saying ?at least I have an iPhone now?.
Another user said that the recent improvements to the website have softened the impact somewhat: “The end of SMS is a blow but won’t be fatal now the patchy service has improved.”
For Twitter, it?s a set back for the hotly-tipped start-up, which has grown to an estimated 2.2 million users since its launch in 2006. Last year the company raised $15 million in funding from investors including Union Square Ventures and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.
However, working how to make the service pay has always been an issue for the company?s creators. Co-Founder Ev Williams said that making the system profitable was a high priority.
“We don’t have any specific plans for a payment system, though that’s interesting,” he said. “But we definitely are striving for a built-in revenue model that is compatible with the open nature of Twitter and its ecosystem, rather than something tacked-on.”
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