Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) - A Few Questions

[quantass]

I have a number of questions in regards to Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) provided by some cell phone services.

1. Is MMS currently available in all markets including Japan, Europe, and North America? If it isn't then when is it expected to fully roll out in the region?

2. Has MMS been embraced by the public where it has been released or has it been largely ignored while people continue to use their standard SMS text messaging?

3. MMS allows one to send/receive videos, audio clips, pictures, and rich text, among other multimedia goodies. Of all the multimedia aspects provided what have people used the most along side there messages? Have those using MMS mostly added a photo with their text message or is video the most over used goodie ?

4. Do service providers, such as Sprint and Verizon, make the MMS Client which customers use or do they license it from some obscure software company? Or does it just come standard with the cell phone's OS provided by the phone manufacturer? If it's licensed software then how much do software company's usually make on such deals -- 1 penny for each MMS message sent?

5. What programming language is the MMS Client created under? J2ME, C++ ?

6. I'm interested in understanding the "MMS protocol" and anything else about how multimedia messaging is achieved. What books or websites can I check out to get a more thorough understanding?


Thanks.

[bassman]

1. Is MMS currently available in all markets including Japan, Europe, and North America? If it isn't then when is it expected to fully roll out in the region?

That'll depend on each country's operators and regulation entities. Portugal already gave the kickoff, other European coutries done it also, and I bet Japan have been using it thoroughly...

2. Has MMS been embraced by the public where it has been released or has it been largely ignored while people continue to use their standard SMS text messaging?

Well, when new tech comes out everybody's always curious, and that motivates some usage of the service. High message and MMS supporting phones' prices is, IMO, still making people stick to plain SMS.

3. MMS allows one to send/receive videos, audio clips, pictures, and rich text, among other multimedia goodies. Of all the multimedia aspects provided what have people used the most along side there messages? Have those using MMS mostly added a photo with their text message or is video the most over used goodie?

I have no reliable stats on this, but my bet is photo (for now...)

6. I'm interested in understanding the "MMS protocol" and anything else about how multimedia messaging is achieved. What books or websites can I check out to get a more thorough understanding?

http://choices.cs.uiuc.edu/MobilSec/posted_docs/Multimedia_Messaging.doc
http://www.3g.co.uk/PR/June2002/3556.htm
http://www.wmlclub.com/docs/

[quantass]

Wonderful reply. bassman.

Would you know where i can download/checkout code for an MMS Client/User-Agent that normally comes with an MMS capable cell phone?

The PDF docs state WAP, SMIL, XML, etc left and right. I really would like to see all of these put together and used in an actual app.

Thanks!

[bassman]

That's a bit hard to get...in the meantime, here's a WAP Tutorial (http://www.w3schools.com/wap/default.asp)