MEF steps gingerly into VZW text-fee debate

Though those survey results show that MEF’s membership generally isn’t too happy with any proposed fee on mobile-terminated text messages, they also indicate there is room for flexibility. One of the biggest issues is that any proposed across-the-board fee wouldn’t affect all text messaging services equally. An airline offering text alerts for gate change information would likely have to eat any per-message fee with no way of recovering its costs. The situation is different for a news-alerts provider like Yahoo or SMS search provider like Cha Cha or Google, which can recoup some of those costs through advertising. Conversely a premium content provider, which bills anywhere from 50 cents to $5 for a content or application download, could more easily absorb a fee into their cost structure.

“We urge Verizon Wireless to reconsider the timing, scale and terms of its proposed fee increase,” Beddows said. “The industry is ready to engage with Verizon Wireless to help find a solution that meets their objectives, without suddenly negatively impacting the businesses of so many companies in the mobile entertainment industry at this delicate moment.”