I remember that the US didn't really use SMS for a long time, but everybody in Europe did.

The US at the time had generous calling plans, and people there didn't yet discover the nice social effect of communicating silently (with texting).

They used bait & switch in Europe (at least where I was) to entice SMS adoption. There was a multitude of free SMS services: online sites where you could send someone a message for free or SMS a service that would forward it without being charged. Then, in the span of a few weeks, the services disappeared.

Not everyone has a smartphone. Many of the people I need to text (especially my parents) have feature phones with no data plans.

Having to remember which messaging system you should use for each person is annoying, so most people just use one.

I have a hard time believing that the density of WhatsApp-capable phones is higher across the developing world (where WhatsApp is popular) than in the US.

Probably not, but it's close to equally high, which is one of Whatsapp's strong points.

Additionally, it's not just popular in "the developing world" (whatever that means), but also in many European countries. I haven't seen a map, but I suspect that Whatsapp is very popular nearly everywhere outside the US and China.

People in the us use messenger. Same as people in Japan use line.

It's just because it matters more that we have all of our contacts than save $20 a month. I think you'd need higher priced SMS or a very large WhatsApp userbase.

Agreed, pretty much anyone in the United States above the poverty level seems willing to spend $20 a month for unlimited texting.

I'm way above that, yet I opted for the pay per text plan and paid 20 cents per text. All my friends made fun of me, but I saved a few dollars since iMessage didn't count toward my costs. However, it effected how people without iPhones would naturally choose to interact with me.

Basically, everyone loves iMessage, but no one thinks twice about alternatives. The general assumption seems to be that it's a god given right that you can send a text to a phone number. iMessage did such wonders obscuring that, whereas having to actually download some other app unveils everything.

>> Agreed, pretty much anyone in the United States above the poverty level seems willing to spend $20 a month for unlimited texting.

Even if you are at poverty level and qualify for a free phone (through the Lifelink program, or 'Obamaphone') you still get something like 250 texts included with that

That is a very good point, even if you don't immediately realize the deeper implications. :)

In India, you generally pay per text message - so if you can convince even 3 of your close friends to start using Whatsapp, you save (say) 20% of your phone bill.

Here in US, if you are going to send more than a few texts a month, you are going to be paying 20 USD. So there is no real monetary incentive (initially) for you and two of your friends to switch to Whatsapp.

So why didn't Indian telecoms implement all-you-can-eat messaging to stop the erosion of users moving to WhatsApp?

Even better they partnered with WhatsApp and offer "unlimited WhatsApp" packs:

http://telecomtalk.info/tata-docomo-launches-unlimited-whats...

SMS costs Rs1 per

The number of WhatsApp users in India is still infinitely less than the plain vanilla SMS people. Specially the ones living in villages which is a huge majority with a huger margin.

We also have SMS packs like 100 SMS a month by paying Rs 40 or so. But a DoT rule (which was actually twisted and misinterpreted by telecos) make that plan ineffective on any festive day and on those days you pay for each SMS and the rate is almost double or x3 or sometime x4 of what you would have paid without the SMS pack :-)

They did for prices ranging from $1 - $2 per month. But text messaging does not do groups remotely as well as Whatsapp does.

You can use it do group thing but then every message sent to group will charged as: cost of one SMS x number of users in the group.

That charge will come to each user of the group whenever a message (%160 chars) is sent.

Indian telecom sector is highly regulated by the Govt. And it is very competitive. So there's no way such an all-or-nothing deal can be introduced so late in the game.

Edit: Moreover, the telecoms do make money on the data plans don't they?

The best part is most womenfolk at home, can use unlimited messaging if all they is a wifi connection and absolutely no balance on their pre paid cards.

Essentially WhatsApp is free messaging as long as you have a internet connection. And that's pretty cheap these days.

It's usually bundled with data, isn't it?

Yes. Most people seem to have unlimited SMS, yet I doubt few people got the plan they did specifically for unlimited SMS.

s/few/many.

iMessages