DISQUS

Jim Harper · 2 years ago

Indeed. In a case like this, the choice is between two systems for marshaling Verizon's behavior. The existing one - market forces - reversed a bad decision in 24 hours. The alternative - government regulation - holds fast to an accumulating litany of bad decisions.

Tom · 2 years ago

What happens when a lower-profile or less popular organization is censored by Verizon? It's wonderful that market pressure forced Verizon to change their policy so quickly in this case. What I don't understand is why Verizon needs or ought to censor SMSes that I intentionally elected to receive.

Believe me, SMS is a world where the market is decidedly not working -- particularly not premium SMS, where carriers take up to a 50% cut (and inexplicably disallow charities from using it, at least in this country).

Fortunately relatively neutral data services seem likely to replace the laughably expensive and limited SMS standard, so I can't get *too* worked up about this. But it really is a pretty bad situation. A very few gatekeepers continue to increase prices (despite increasing demand and no practical limit on supply) and prevent small players from using the medium.