josulliv101@gmail.com wrote:

>Hi,
>
>I would like to promote an email address which people can text message
>via their cellphone. I would then process these emails and send a
>reply. The reply address would be the person's email equivalent of
>their cellphone number (such as joe@vext.com). Then, the person would
>be pinged via text message with my reply. From what I have read it
>seems that this is possible.

Perhaps not on all carriers, but on at least some, yes. I know VZW
can send and receive email via text messages.

>So the cellphone user who initiated the call would be charged twice -
>once for the out going text message, and again for receiving the
>reply. Is this now 15 cents each way?

Depends on the carrier and the plan. Text messaging without a plan
has gotten expensive, but with a plan it can be less than a penny a
message.

>As for me, would I be charged
>anything? Not sure how they would even know who to charge.

I don't think you would be charged, unless you ordinarily pay to send
and receive email.

>So this scenarios works in the United States for all the major
>carriers-- what abou International? The international user would need
>to send an actual email via their handheld device, then receive an
>actual email?

email doesn't, in general, know whether it's international.

>I am new to the mobile world and would appreciate anybody offering
>their insight on things I am not thinking of, like are their
>restrictions by carriers on use of their "@vtext.com" email addresses.

I don't know of any, but I haven't studied it. Carriers are paid by
the message, why would they put on restrictions as llong as there's
not a spam problem?