A new sms site

Webmonkey

Hi There,

I'm planning on building a hobby website that will offer a free service.
Basically what it will be is you will sign up with it, entering your Vodafone username and password for vodafone.ie.
Vodafone offer 300 text messages a month. What i'm thinking is offering a service where you can get free alerts, horoscopes, news headlines, email alerts, weather updates etc etc, you get the idea. So you will have 300 a month free texts, most people don't even use them so they would make good use of it by doing this.
Other services will involve a phone exchange, for sale section, photo gallery for photos taken with your mobile. free email.
Another idea i was thinking was, reminders, i know you got them in phones but it would be better again with a text message. Set a yearly, monthly reminder, this will send you a text message automatically then everymonth. You will also be able to text from this site, like www.donaloconnor.net/sms/ and handle groups and contacts. I believe this is a new idea and i think it would be good for the irish mobile community, a place to be.

What i'm looking for are web developers, PHP & MySQL to help me. Im sure it will be successful but then again vodafone could come making us shut it down.
Other features i'm hoping to include are combining text bundles, like add another sim card to your account and get 600,900 texts free a month for other alerts, reminders etc.
I think you all get the idea so any web dev people willing to help me?, it will be a fun project. I won't pay because for the one reason it will not be a profit making site, but if you have spare time it will be an intereresting project. I'm also hoping to include o2 and meteor down the road also.

I know there are people here that will be saying..hhmmm they storing our vodafone user name and passwords in a database...well thats true we will have to but hey, its a free service and don't worry your username and passwords will be secure.

Cheers for reading.

Donal / Webmonkey

Contact me @ donal .:At:. donalconnor.net

The Corinthian

What you’re suggesting is quite ambitious, and I honestly wish you all the best with it. However I would like to make a few quick observations:

1. Basing the functionality of a site upon screen scraping or deep linking is an inherently unstable affair. All the company you’re screen scraping from or deep linking to would have to do is block your IP or change a few variable names and your site would fall over. And, trust me, they will do that.
2. Where’s your content (horoscopes, news headlines, email alerts, weather updates, etc.) coming from? Unless you purchase it, or manage to find it for free, you’ll be running the risk of being sued (or at least just closed down) for copyright infringement.
3. Are you guaranteeing that people’s usernames or passwords will be secure? And are you familiar with the Data Protection Act?
4. Who will own the site - legally rather than some fuzzy concept of community? After all, no one is likely to be in favour of helping you out if you can just go and make a bundle out of their labour at a later date.

Webmonkey

Originally posted by The Corinthian
What you’re suggesting is quite ambitious, and I honestly wish you all the best with it. However I would like to make a few quick observations:

1. Basing the functionality of a site upon screen scraping or deep linking is an inherently unstable affair. All the company you’re screen scraping from or deep linking to would have to do is block your IP or change a few variable names and your site would fall over. And, trust me, they will do that.
2. Where’s your content (horoscopes, news headlines, email alerts, weather updates, etc.) coming from? Unless you purchase it, or manage to find it for free, you’ll be running the risk of being sued (or at least just closed down) for copyright infringement.
3. Are you guaranteeing that people’s usernames or passwords will be secure? And are you familiar with the Data Protection Act?
4. Who will own the site - legally rather than some fuzzy concept of community? After all, no one is likely to be in favour of helping you out if you can just go and make a bundle out of their labour at a later date.

Thanks for that. I'm going to have a class for the deep linking, it will be dedicated to that and if they change it , i'll just have to change this (really easy) and the site will be functioning again.

( Edit: yes i know the IP blocking is a problem )

Yes content, hmm i'm sure there are sites that offer free content and allow you to use it. I will first of all contact the website and ask to use their content. Further more i might offer them small advertising space (I really want a ad clean site but if it comes to this, then very well

No I can't guarantee that people's usernames and passwords will be secure unfortuntally. I will have important terms that the user will have to accept before signing up with the system.

Owners...hmmm it would be best if it was a community, then no one as such would be responsible. But i'm willing to take the chance in it and i know other people there are too. They can't do all that much only take the site...yeah it could be a disaster after spending so much time making it but i'm willing to take that gamble.

http://www.donaloconnor.net/vom . I started the design, well had this design i made lying around here so said i would use it rather than leaving it go to waste. I'm going to stick to this design for the moment to get things going.


Ok anyone left that would like to help me?

hostyle

I'd have offered to help, if you had offered decent answers to The Corinthians questions. But you didn't. You _will_ get banned for using Vodaphones free SMSes as your own, and attempting to add extra value to them without their permission.

Webmonkey

Originally posted by hostyle
I'd have offered to help, if you had offered decent answers to The Corinthians questions. But you didn't. You _will_ get banned for using Vodaphones free SMSes as your own, and attempting to add extra value to them without their permission.

Your drunk :mad:


PS. Everyone will use their own vodafone free text messages, and there is no extra value, all they are, are 160char sms messages

p

Yea, you're so asking for **** by trying that.
While it's a novel idea, vodafone would not put up with it for very long. I'd seriously question the legality of redistributing other people's services.

Also, why would anyone give you their vodefone password. That's terribly insecure, and also, no doubt against the agreement you signed up with vodafone.

Webmonkey

yeah your right p. Am yeah lads i think i'll leave it alone. Oh well

sci0x

Are you joking Webmonkey, this is a great idea. Stick at it and F**K these ignorant, critical, sarcastic bullies. You guys make me disgusted to be Irish.

If Webmonkey had posted this post on a board on another country he would have received critisicm of course to help him improve but not this damning bulls*it. He would have also received enthusiasm on his idea, some help with his idea.

But NO, as soon as he posted his new idea which he was probably very excited about and full of ideas on his new project he gets interrogated by The Corinthian followed by negativity from hostyle and p like the sheep that he is follows the crowd and throws more insults on the idea. At the end of all this crap, he gives up on the project.

Not one f**cking word of positivity from you pack of bast*rds. Im not joking here you should be ashamed of yourselves in all fairness. Its a wonder there are any entrepreneurs in the country at all. A person shares his idea and he is mocked and ridiculed for it.

Webmonkey, Ireland is no place to share your ideas (as you can see), try Neowin.net and Pro-networks and your idea will be received with enthusiasm and hopefully your venture will be a sucess. Just dont give up.

jmcc

Originally posted by sci0x
Are you joking Webmonkey, this is a great idea. Stick at it and F**K these ignorant, critical, sarcastic bullies. You guys make me disgusted to be Irish.

Let's see - Corinthian has a bit more experience with mobile phone applications including SMS work than most people here. His advice in this case is precise and sound. I am not sure what kind of expertise, if any, you have with mobile apps. This is essentially a web interface to a mobile app.

He would have also received enthusiasm on his idea, some help with his idea.

Don't be so stupid. When professionals point out the potential problems (and the DPA is a very serious one) then people should pay attention. If he believes strongly enough in his idea then he shouldn't really need confirmation of its viability. However in the real world where copyright, the DPA and other people's services are involved, the rules can screw up any venture quickly.

A person shares his idea and he is mocked and ridiculed for it.

It was a request for comment on the project. Calm down before you do yourself an injury.

As any entrepreneur will tell you, the idea is the easy part - the execution is the hard part. Most entrepreneurs will assess an idea on one fundamental aspect - does it make money? The bones of the idea are there but there is no real concentration on making the project either pay for itself or making a profit. The business structure is nebulous at best - community ownership. The execution is not planned - it is a request for help from programmers.

Webmonkey, I think you've got the approach wrong. To a large extent you are not only reinventing the wheel, you are making it square as well. You are hitting it from the web interface angle - why not approach it from the mobile phone interface angle. You will still have to observe the DPA and copyright legislation though.

Regards...jmcc

sci0x

Ok I agree i went overboard. My main problem here is that one word of encouragement was given. After all that was said Webmonkey has completely given up on his idea "yeah your right p. Am yeah lads i think i'll leave it alone. Oh well".

I mean it was only a hobby nothing serious. There was no need to put down his idea so much that he doesn't want to do it anymore.

Gordon

Originally posted by sci0x
My main problem here is that one word of encouragement was given.

I wish Webmonkey all the best with it.

The Corinthian

Originally posted by sci0x
I mean it was only a hobby nothing serious. There was no need to put down his idea so much that he doesn't want to do it anymore.

Just because something may be an amateur or hobby site does not give it a licence to break all the rules or ignore common sense. All I raised were a number of issues that would become apparent very rapidly had he gone ahead with the project.

I’ve been dealing with the mobile operators for a good few years at this stage and I can guarantee that while they may ignore deep linking from a few scripts, they would not if it originated from a rival portal. After all, the facility to send SMS from their site is not there because they love their customers, but because they want to drive traffic to their portals so that they can sell them more services. A rival portal that bypasses all their marketing is in direct contravention of this (not to mention their perennial obsession with the control of content) and would be very rapidly shut down.

This would leave Webmonkey, et al, in a position where after spending perhaps weeks part-time putting the whole site together, it would get shut down within days (and they will notice it within days - the marketing departments off all three operators lurk on the mobiles forum).

The issue of SMS content is another - it’s not free (if it is, I’d be more than happy to hear where). So given this, unless you pay for it, your only other two alternatives are to generate it yourself or steal it.

The question of security and the DPA has already been covered by jmcc and requires no further embellishment.

And finally the question of ownership and liability. Communities are great fun when they’re just a hobby, but what happens when the hobby becomes commercially viable? Back in 1999 a “WAP FAQ” was put together as a hobby by a Norwegian developer. A community built up around it, contributing and adding their knowledge to the FAQ as it grew. Suddenly it sold the FAQ to Internet.com for (AFAIR) a five-figure sum - as the original developer owned the site, he was perfectly entitled to pocket all of the money. Where did that leave the contributors (I was one, but TBH I didn’t mind)?

The same goes for liability - telling a judge that you shouldn’t get sued for libel or copyright infringement because it’s only a hobby site is a good defence. And when lawyers are looking to target someone they’ll look for someone associated who’s solvent - so even if you did nothing wrong, they may come after you (or if you’re under 18, after your parents). Calling something a hobby is not a licence to be irresponsible, after all.

So frankly, there’s no such thing as nothing serious - once you put something in the public arena you have to stand by it, regardless of your intention - in cyberspace, everyone can hear you scream.

As for your comments on entrepreneurs and cynicism, it amazes me how short people’s memories are. Perhaps the whole dot bomb collapse that resulted from all those ventures that entrepreneurs rushed into without considering that they were never even commercially viable was just a bad dream?

The less said about your disgust at being Irish, the better :rolleyes:

Personally, having seen Webmonkey’s posts before, I would wish him the best of luck. He appears to have more ability than even many so-called professionals I’ve seen posting here. But you can’t seriously think it a good idea to encourage someone to peruse a project without having examined it ruthlessly first? What would you say if someone posted that they we’re going to develop a multilingual e-commerce site for the sale of pork products - in Arabic and Hebrew? Would you enthusiastically wish them the best or perhaps politely make a few observations..?

clearz

Go for it Webmonkey. Id certainly sign up myself. I wrote a few classes in java before that logged into o2's website and sent SMS messages (I remember sending around 3000 messages to a mates phone. He was getting them solid for arround 3 days:D ) but ever since o2 did up their site I cant get it to work. I have all the new varibles and everything but I keep getting a 403 error.