160 Characters announces Cardiff based company, W2Wave has built an SMS domain checker
A simple text message request will check to see if an internet domain name is available or not.
By sending DOMAIN NAME followed by DOMAINNAME to 81551 a response is sent with whether or not the name has been registered. The service costs 25p for each request.
One word really. Why?
It seems to me that the mobile services that work best are:
1. Stuff you use on your mobile (ie games, ringtones etc)
2. Stuff you can use to kill time when you’re out and about
3. Stuff for people without (regular) access to a PC
4. Stuff you need to do urgently and can’t wait to get back to the PC
5. Stuff that’s relevant to your immediate location
Are the anymore, anyone?
It also seems to me that this service falls into none of the above. I’ve bought a fair few domains in my time. And I just can’t see myself ever spending 25p to check something that I could check for free back in the office.
More to the point, anyone who’s ever tried to buy a groovy name will know that the first 250 or so you think of are taken. So it’s going to be rather frustrating to keep spending the dosh only to be constantly disappointed. And when you do find one? You have to wait until you get to the PC anyway, to buy it.
Sometimes people launch services because it’s possible. Video calling springs to mind. But just coz it’s possible, doesn’t mean that people will use it.
Good luck to them and maybe it’s very clever from a technical point of view or something, but it seems to me to be just a simple database interrogation. Hardly showcase stuff.
Hmmmm. Or maybe I’ve missed the point.
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