Text Messaging Featured Article

Boy, come out with good idea and everybody wants in. Next thing you know: Group text messaging wars.

Group-texting app GroupMe “may have just updated its mobile offerings,” according to industry observer Brenna Ehrlich, “but it seems as though the service has a few tricks up its sleeve, delivering even more new updates.”

GroupMe is simply a way to create an instant private SMS chatroom on your phone. People liked the idea -- it got $10.6 million in Series B funding in a round led by Khosla Ventures (with participation from additional new investors, including General Catalyst Partners and First Round Capital, and previous investors Lerer Ventures, Betaworks (News - Alert) and SV Angel) in January, Ehrlich noted.

At the time, early January, TMC’s Ed Silverstein reported, David Weiden of Khosla Ventures and Ken Lerer of Lerer Ventures would also join the GroupMe Board of Directors: “We’re honored to have the continued support of our initial investors and the opportunity to bring on such a great new syndicate,” said GroupMe co-founders, Jared Hecht and Steve Martocci, at the time.

And of course, like any other good idea, it spawned a host of imitators. Today you can pick from Fast Society, described by Ehrlich as “a party-centric service that recently updated with a slew of features and an Android (News - Alert) app.” Of course if you want to be on the side of world domination you can go with Beluga, now a Facebook subsidiary. Heaven only knows what SXSW is coming out with.

But GroupMe isn’t giving up its throne easily, Ehrlich says, noting that for GroupMe 2.1, the Android and iPhone (News - Alert) app lets users “create groups that friends can request to join. Users can also share groups on Facebook and Twitter.” She says users can also see what groups they have in common with other members, and if you have a bad data connection, “GroupMe will let you switch to SMS.” It now has push notifications too.

SMS text messaging is constantly making headlines, but not as many “texters” are familiar with another form of text messaging called Long Code. For more information on Long Code text messaging, visit TSG Global's website, provider of a combined VoIP and texting solution.

David Sims is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To read more of David’s articles, please visit his columnist page. He also blogs for TMCnet here.

Edited by Stefanie Mosca