Does anyone know how to send a text or SMS message from the UK or Europe (either from a cellphone or via a website) to a cellphone in the US? I know that GSM is only offered by some providers in the US, and is therefore only available in some locations. However, any help on the matter would be appreciated as I'm trying to figure out how to get in touch with a friend over there. Yes, I know I COULD call, but that's beside the point. I look forward to hearing from you guys soon. Regards, Alasdair.

You've got a few options. If you know their cell phone provider, you can usually go to their website and send a subscriber a message. There are a few places to look up the provider, http://www.searchbug.com/peoplefinder/landorcell.aspx is one. Looking it up won't always work though, as it can require an intricate knowledge of who owns what towers and who bought them five years ago.

The new AOL instant messenger allows you to add cell phones to your buddy list. Just download the latest beta, and put the number proceeded by a plus sign. This is probably your best bet.

Matthew

Well, if the person you're talking about has Verizon, you could use this page.

Cingular uses cellnumber@mobile.mycingular.com and AT&T uses something similar. Some operators just work (I can SMS between a US T-Mobile SIM and UK friends no problems), so I assume you have actually tried it?

Also I hear rumours that some of the smaller carriers block incomming SMS if the user doesn't subscribe to their outgoing SMS service.

AT&T uses something similar.

Yep,

area_code_and_cell_number@mobile.att.net

Now if only orange could do something like that in the UK....

Alternatively, for verizon, just use 10digitcellnumber@vtext.com
If you can send to an internet address from your phone, then you can send to anyone.

Orange do sort of have something like that. If you use their Orange Email service then you get a text message everytime you get a new email. You get the sender and a few words off the subject line. I used to have it enabled for everybody that emails me but Orange seems to attract a lot of spammers so I've turned it off now. There is an option to only alert you for certain addresses.

When I was with One-2-One (shows how long ago it was) they had a service there you'd email <yournumber>@one2one.net and it would send it to your mobile. If it exceeded the 160 character limit then it would split it up in multiple messages. Best part was that it was totally free but they soon realised it was cutting into their profits so they made it a per message charge.

- Trevor