Pending Removal of SMS Gateway

Category: Zone BBS Suggestions and Feedback

Post 1 by Jage (Zone BBS, a decade of madness) on Monday, 10-Dec-2012 18:30:27

Barring a major outcry, we plan on removing the SMS Gateway from the site. We have chosen to do this for several reasons including message reliability, a lack of proper spam and opt-out controls, and other additional upkeep that could be spent on other features. There are websites which allow you to send free SMS messages to most carriers which we encourage you to try.
Our apologies for any inconvenience this may cause.
Any thoughts before I blow up this thing?

Post 2 by Runner229 (I've now got the silver prolific poster award! wahoo!) on Monday, 10-Dec-2012 18:55:56

Go for it. I never even knew we had that feature on here, and I have no use for it. Hahaha.

Post 3 by chelslicious (like it or not, I'm gonna say what I mean. all the time.) on Monday, 10-Dec-2012 19:51:09

nor do I. I'm glad to see it's being taken away, honestly.

Post 4 by write away (The Zone's Blunt Object) on Monday, 10-Dec-2012 22:57:25

Good move. Perhaps you can use the resources this frees up for other useful things for the site, whatever that may be.

Post 5 by Jage (Zone BBS, a decade of madness) on Monday, 10-Dec-2012 23:46:30

The option is called SMS Gateway on the Main Menu, well it is for now.

Post 6 by season (the invisible soul) on Tuesday, 11-Dec-2012 1:11:01

Great idea. There're lots of website out there that allow you to send sms for free. Further more, there's always other option, e.g. Skype text, and also IMessages etc etc.
When the idea first exist it was great, but now, i think its just taking up unnecesary server space.

Post 7 by Dave_H (the boringest guy you'll ever know) on Tuesday, 11-Dec-2012 11:32:33

When the idea first came, it was great, but now it's time has gone. This leads to my next question-- does the traffic on Zone By Phone still justify its cost?

Post 8 by TechnologyUser2012 (I've now got the silver prolific poster award! wahoo!) on Tuesday, 11-Dec-2012 13:23:54

yep I agree with others go ahead and remove it. Never used SMS gateway and didn't even know of its existance until now.

Post 9 by Shadow_Cat (I've now got the silver prolific poster award! wahoo!) on Tuesday, 11-Dec-2012 14:55:30

Agreed. It was a great idea when it first came out, but I'd say take it down.

Post 10 by laced-unlaced (Account disabled) on Wednesday, 12-Dec-2012 7:27:13

good.

i'm actually glad it's going... it never even worked for me- even when i did try using it

Post 11 by maddog (I'll have the last word, thank you!) on Wednesday, 12-Dec-2012 8:31:00

There is no longer any use for SMS gateway, but I don't think that we should start discussing removing zone by phone quite yet. Most people still look for chat hotlines, and not everyone can/is able/is willing to get on teamtalk or ventrilo to conference for a host of other reasons, and the phone system is a convenient replacement for that for those who want to still talk to others.

Post 12 by Jage (Zone BBS, a decade of madness) on Saturday, 15-Dec-2012 17:32:20

Yup, ZBP isn't going anywhere. It's not really a cost issue as more of a maintenance issue and the code that would be required to make it work well again. ZBP is working fine so there's no reason to get rid of it. It does take a fair amount of bandwidth, but prices have come down over the years.
Thanks for all of your feedback.

Post 13 by Jage (Zone BBS, a decade of madness) on Saturday, 15-Dec-2012 19:51:19

RIP to the SMS Gateway

Post 14 by season (the invisible soul) on Saturday, 15-Dec-2012 21:43:44

ZBP should stay. It use as frequent as TT if not more. It might not justify for those who may not use it, but i think, there're people using it enough to justify it's usefulness on the site.

Post 15 by Jage (Zone BBS, a decade of madness) on Monday, 17-Dec-2012 19:14:24

Again, ZBP isn't going anywhere, so no need to worry.