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Hospitals embrace SMS technology
by IconoclasT at 11:19 am EDT, Aug 15, 2004

SMS is pretty much ubiquitous in Europe, Asia and Australia. Why hasn't it caught on yet in the US?

LONDON, England (CNN) -- It is great for organizing meetings, to tell someone a piece of information and even voting for your favorite "Big Brother" housemate.

Now, text messaging is increasingly being used by UK hospitals to remind patients about outpatient appointments -- and could potentially save the National Health Service millions of pounds every year.

RE: Hospitals embrace SMS technology
by Decius at 10:47 am EDT, Aug 16, 2004

IconoclasT wrote:
] SMS is pretty much ubiquitous in Europe, Asia and Australia.
] Why hasn't it caught on yet in the US?

Because texting is a pain in the ass on a little phone keyboard and the costs of calling instead are significantly lower. In the US you've got flat rate phone calls and SMS costs extra. No one is going to pay extra for a service no one uses. In Europe SMS is cheaper then calling, and so it has taken off.

The sucky thing about SMS is that its totally unreliable. Its like a pager. If you recipient's phone isn't on when the message goes out it drops into the bit bucket.