7 ms·

Nomad SMS – Receive a local SMS anywhere in the world

47 points by dvko 12y ago

kwhitefoot 12y ago
I must be missing something. I receive texts from my bank on my Norwegian number where ever I am in the world. The Nomad SMS web page doesn't explain why there is a problem.
- bryceadams 12y ago
  Hi! If you didn't have your Norwegian sim card in your phone though, you wouldn't be able to receive it. Also some people don't have a local sim card (eg. I travel around Asia, no sim from Australia) and those that do may have to pay global roaming charges to receive SMSes. I should probably explain the need for it a bit better. Thanks for checking it out :)
  - danpalmer 12y ago
    Yeah, might be good to explain the reasoning. Coming from the UK, I've never heard of pricing to receive a message, we just don't have it, and I believe it's actually banned, as the user doesn't have the choice in receiving a message (unlike a call which they can just not answer).
- malditojavi 12y ago
  Spaniard living in Belgium for 3 years. For every purchase I make online with my Spanish card (issued by a Spanish bank), if I don't receive the code into a Spanish phone number, there is no other way of receiving it. I might start using this! :)
  - bryceadams 12y ago
    Yeah, it's an annoying situation! Exactly why I created it :)
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
bryceadams 12y ago
Post on the creation of it if anyone's interested - http://bryceadams.com/built-nomad-sms-3-days/ http://bryceadams.com/built-nomad-sms-3-days/ Happy to answer any questions and hear your thoughts!
- iqonik 12y ago
  If you change providers, don't change the price. It seems people are willing to pay the current rate and if anything I would experiment with charging more whilst getting your costs down!
__xtrimsky 12y ago
You should change the way the rates are displayed. When I saw 5$ (p/m), I thought it was Per Message. And I instantly closed the window. Later on I came back just to check for another country, and noticed on another page that it was per month. But I highly recommend you change: Pricing (p/m) to : Pricing (per month)
- jszymborski 12y ago
  I had precisely the same reaction.
- rnprince 12y ago
  I had exactly the same reaction as well.
- bryceadams 12y ago
  Good point, will fix this up!
  - daveasdf 12y ago
    Now the pricing page states "(p/message)". Was this a typo, or is it really $5 per message? Edit: lower down in the fine print it states "per month", but the table heading states "p/message".
    - bryceadams 12y ago
      Fixed, I'm an idiot. It's per/month.
      - jzwinck 12y ago
        The text should literally read "Price (USD per month)". Then it will be clear, unambiguous, and obviate the need for the snippet at the bottom about "$USD" (which is not a standard notation).
mhoad 12y ago
I am really excited for this service. I tend to pack up and move every 6 months to a new country so things like online banking and what not are generally a bit of a pain in the ass and require me to carry around multiple hard tokens. This could well be the end of that which would be a huge help.
jkot 12y ago
I am bit sceptical. I would not trust phone number associated with my bank account to similar service. Also double or even triple sim phones are very cheap and can recieve text globaly.
pudo 12y ago
> Q: Is it secure? > A: [...] SMS's are impossible to intercept [...]. cough Are we talking about the same technology? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ0I5tl0YLY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ0I5tl0YLY
- dogma1138 12y ago
  I worked for Verint some years ago, still have friends that do and they all laughed at that presentation saying it's about 10 years out of date :) The "commercial" tracking solutions are hardly as clandestine as people might think, their major consumers are the cell companies themselves. As their systems were never designed to facilitate easy tracking and interception they use those for anything from identifying cloned phones to facilitating court ordered wire taps. For the most part the capabilities of these systems without an active participation from the carrier are minimal. However plenty of other systems exist which require no support from the phone carrier. e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1l1nRql7JE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1l1nRql7JE I love these types of commercials for some reason the cheap acting always makes me chuckle..
- bryceadams 12y ago
  I'll make that clearer - thanks!
BuildTheRobots 12y ago
so basically we're talking a store and forward service that lets you spawn local numbers capable of receiving SMS.
- bryceadams 12y ago
  Exactly!
zhovner 12y ago
You can get the same with Google Voice.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- bryceadams 12y ago
  I've heard that but just US people for a US number. Anyway, the issue was that I (Australian) couldn't get an Australian number :) Thanks for checking it out!
- redthrow 12y ago
  And in Canada, Fongo: http://www.fongo.com/ http://www.fongo.com/
kolev 12y ago
15 countries is not "anywhere" in the world.
- grecy 12y ago
  You can receive the texts when you are anywhere in the world.
  - dr_win 12y ago
    Not true. I'm in Vietnam right now and SMSes from my Czech (Vodafone) number are not going through. I believe I have roaming set properly up and my Czech SIM is properly connected to a local operator. I had never similar problem when traveling abroad. SMSes always worked just fine.
    - grecy 12y ago
      This service sends the incoming texts to an email address.. so it means you can "get them" (get the emails) anywhere in the world. it has nothing to do with SIM cards and roaming.
- bryceadams 12y ago
  Yeah, sorry that wasn't clearer. It's just ~15 countries that you can buy a number for, but you receive the SMS anywhere in the world by email / etc.
  - kolev 12y ago
    Thanks for the clarification.
croisillon 12y ago
So I tried a couple of countries and noticed an error at least for Austria: you display the number as +43 0676... It won't work, it should be without the leading 0 : +43 676 and so on
- bryceadams 12y ago
  That's just how it auto-formats / displays. The numbers are from Twilio and I've got some customers using Austrian numbers. Sorry for the confusion.
  - croisillon 12y ago
    I don't know, the number displayed that way is wrong. With Lithuania for example you don't display +370 86 instead of +370 6 although locally the number would be 86 like an austrian local number would be 0676...
ma2rten 12y ago
If I was you I wouldn't link to the page where you explain how you created the product. It might turn potential customers off that you created it only in 3 days. Also, when they know you used twillo as a backend, they can check out exactly how much you profit you are making.
methou 12y ago
Can I use this service with Battle.net? They don't support VoIP based SMS providers.
- bryceadams 12y ago
  As long as they don't send messages from a shortcode number.
NIL8 12y ago
Let me get this straight... I rent a number from you in another country. I can give this number out as my own so that others can send me a text. The text gets forwarded from the rented number to my email. Is this correct? If so, I can already think of a couple of ways that it could come in handy.

47 points by dvko 12y ago

I must be missing something. I receive texts from my bank on my Norwegian number where ever I am in the world. The Nomad SMS web page doesn't explain why there is a problem.

bryceadams 12y ago
Hi! If you didn't have your Norwegian sim card in your phone though, you wouldn't be able to receive it. Also some people don't have a local sim card (eg. I travel around Asia, no sim from Australia) and those that do may have to pay global roaming charges to receive SMSes. I should probably explain the need for it a bit better. Thanks for checking it out :)
- danpalmer 12y ago
  Yeah, might be good to explain the reasoning. Coming from the UK, I've never heard of pricing to receive a message, we just don't have it, and I believe it's actually banned, as the user doesn't have the choice in receiving a message (unlike a call which they can just not answer).
malditojavi 12y ago
Spaniard living in Belgium for 3 years. For every purchase I make online with my Spanish card (issued by a Spanish bank), if I don't receive the code into a Spanish phone number, there is no other way of receiving it. I might start using this! :)
- bryceadams 12y ago
  Yeah, it's an annoying situation! Exactly why I created it :)
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]

bryceadams 12y ago

Post on the creation of it if anyone's interested - http://bryceadams.com/built-nomad-sms-3-days/ http://bryceadams.com/built-nomad-sms-3-days/ Happy to answer any questions and hear your thoughts!

iqonik 12y ago
If you change providers, don't change the price. It seems people are willing to pay the current rate and if anything I would experiment with charging more whilst getting your costs down!

__xtrimsky 12y ago

You should change the way the rates are displayed. When I saw 5$ (p/m), I thought it was Per Message. And I instantly closed the window. Later on I came back just to check for another country, and noticed on another page that it was per month. But I highly recommend you change: Pricing (p/m) to : Pricing (per month)

jszymborski 12y ago
I had precisely the same reaction.
rnprince 12y ago
I had exactly the same reaction as well.
bryceadams 12y ago
Good point, will fix this up!
- daveasdf 12y ago
  Now the pricing page states "(p/message)". Was this a typo, or is it really $5 per message? Edit: lower down in the fine print it states "per month", but the table heading states "p/message".
  - bryceadams 12y ago
    Fixed, I'm an idiot. It's per/month.
    - jzwinck 12y ago
      The text should literally read "Price (USD per month)". Then it will be clear, unambiguous, and obviate the need for the snippet at the bottom about "$USD" (which is not a standard notation).

mhoad 12y ago

I am really excited for this service. I tend to pack up and move every 6 months to a new country so things like online banking and what not are generally a bit of a pain in the ass and require me to carry around multiple hard tokens. This could well be the end of that which would be a huge help.

jkot 12y ago

I am bit sceptical. I would not trust phone number associated with my bank account to similar service. Also double or even triple sim phones are very cheap and can recieve text globaly.

pudo 12y ago

> Q: Is it secure? > A: [...] SMS's are impossible to intercept [...]. cough Are we talking about the same technology? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ0I5tl0YLY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ0I5tl0YLY

dogma1138 12y ago
I worked for Verint some years ago, still have friends that do and they all laughed at that presentation saying it's about 10 years out of date :) The "commercial" tracking solutions are hardly as clandestine as people might think, their major consumers are the cell companies themselves. As their systems were never designed to facilitate easy tracking and interception they use those for anything from identifying cloned phones to facilitating court ordered wire taps. For the most part the capabilities of these systems without an active participation from the carrier are minimal. However plenty of other systems exist which require no support from the phone carrier. e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1l1nRql7JE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c1l1nRql7JE I love these types of commercials for some reason the cheap acting always makes me chuckle..
bryceadams 12y ago
I'll make that clearer - thanks!

BuildTheRobots 12y ago

so basically we're talking a store and forward service that lets you spawn local numbers capable of receiving SMS.

bryceadams 12y ago
Exactly!

zhovner 12y ago

You can get the same with Google Voice.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
bryceadams 12y ago
I've heard that but just US people for a US number. Anyway, the issue was that I (Australian) couldn't get an Australian number :) Thanks for checking it out!
redthrow 12y ago
And in Canada, Fongo: http://www.fongo.com/ http://www.fongo.com/

kolev 12y ago

15 countries is not "anywhere" in the world.

grecy 12y ago
You can receive the texts when you are anywhere in the world.
- dr_win 12y ago
  Not true. I'm in Vietnam right now and SMSes from my Czech (Vodafone) number are not going through. I believe I have roaming set properly up and my Czech SIM is properly connected to a local operator. I had never similar problem when traveling abroad. SMSes always worked just fine.
  - grecy 12y ago
    This service sends the incoming texts to an email address.. so it means you can "get them" (get the emails) anywhere in the world. it has nothing to do with SIM cards and roaming.
bryceadams 12y ago
Yeah, sorry that wasn't clearer. It's just ~15 countries that you can buy a number for, but you receive the SMS anywhere in the world by email / etc.
- kolev 12y ago
  Thanks for the clarification.

croisillon 12y ago

So I tried a couple of countries and noticed an error at least for Austria: you display the number as +43 0676... It won't work, it should be without the leading 0 : +43 676 and so on

bryceadams 12y ago
That's just how it auto-formats / displays. The numbers are from Twilio and I've got some customers using Austrian numbers. Sorry for the confusion.
- croisillon 12y ago
  I don't know, the number displayed that way is wrong. With Lithuania for example you don't display +370 86 instead of +370 6 although locally the number would be 86 like an austrian local number would be 0676...

ma2rten 12y ago

If I was you I wouldn't link to the page where you explain how you created the product. It might turn potential customers off that you created it only in 3 days. Also, when they know you used twillo as a backend, they can check out exactly how much you profit you are making.

methou 12y ago

Can I use this service with Battle.net? They don't support VoIP based SMS providers.

bryceadams 12y ago
As long as they don't send messages from a shortcode number.

NIL8 12y ago

Let me get this straight... I rent a number from you in another country. I can give this number out as my own so that others can send me a text. The text gets forwarded from the rented number to my email. Is this correct? If so, I can already think of a couple of ways that it could come in handy.