> Phone plans used to come with a limited number of SMS messages per month (or even none), and the rates per SMS if you went over the limit were beyond extortionate.

But wasn't cellular data priced similarly extortionately back then?

It was certainly too expensive, but nowhere near as expensive as paying twenty five cents for an SMS message that maxed out at 140 bytes.

Before iPhone or Android existed, Blackberry was very popular with teens because you got unlimited messaging on Blackberry Messenger included with the data plan you got with a Blackberry.

Eventually there were cell phone plans where you could add unlimited SMS for an additional fee regardless of what phone you used.

By the time the iPhone rolled around, all the American iPhone plans included unlimited SMS messages without an additional fee.

>But wasn't cellular data priced similarly extortionately back then?

I guess it depends on your terms. I had--I think--a 2GB per month data plan (which was actually fairly reasonable for mobile at the time) and later went to "unlimited" but I was still paying something like 10 cents per text for a time. I didn't text a lot so I just paid a la carte until I changed plans.

Communications charges have changed a lot over time. I remember when long distance calls were something like $1/minute.

> Communications charges have changed a lot over time. I remember when long distance calls were something like $1/minute.

I can remember Verizon being sued because they forced handset manufacturers to disable Bluetooth for file transfers, because Verizon used to charge you money every time you transferred photos to or from your phone.

The carriers used to completely own the entire phone experience. That's what really changed with Android and iOS. Walled gardens notwithstanding, you have access to a far less restricted and curated set of applications.

Yes, but if you had wifi iMessage was essentially “free”. I always though of it as message went over the internet, vs message went over SMS.

iMessage was released 11 years ago now. Can’t blame Apple for what not considering what the toddlers of the time would eventually do with the technology.