Push IM vs. SMS: Will IM Take Over Eventually?
The advent of push notifications and IM on iPhone 3.0 has raised the question (again) of how IM might impact SMS and related carrier fees. In 2007 we speculated about whether IM on mobile devices might one day take over vs. SMS:
[O]ver the long term IM could potentially replace SMS for mobile users, especially if people shift from text plans to Internet plans (unless they're bundled) as the mobile Internet becomes more important.
With a growing range of SMS alternatives such as Facebook, Twitter, mobile Skype, Google Latitude "shout outs" and various mobile IM clients (and aggregators) we're likely to see some shift in messaging volumes to IM from SMS. There's no immediate danger to SMS (and carrier fees) but that's certainly going to be the long-term trend.