How to send an SMS from cell phone to an AIM user
I’m not sure if this is common knowledge or not, but I only learned about it recently. Some cell phones let you sign on to instant messenger clients (usually AIM), but that can be less than ideal. When I did that a couple years ago, every single communication my phone did with AIM counted as a text message. That includes messages you send or receive, as well as sign-on related messages, and even disconnection messages. I’d get disconnected fairly frequently, and every time that happened, it would cost me 2-3 text messages to sign back on. At 10 cents a pop (unless you pay for a plan with a bucket of monthly text messages), that got annoying pretty fast.
Well, I recently found out that you can send a message to an AIM user, using your cell phone, without logging on with any actual AIM client. Just send an SMS text message with the following format:
Message: AIM_screen_name: message text
I know there are all sorts of “mobile AIM” features, but this is one simple one that has come in handy several times for me, already.
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