# "Text 1234 to 23331 on your cell phone": How do they provide this service? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 3, 2006, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/text-1234-to-23331-on-your-cell-phone-how-do-they-provide-this-service/382697 "2006-12-03T16:44:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 5\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ShortBus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2bfe46/32.png) [@ShortBus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShortBus)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2006, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/text-1234-to-23331-on-your-cell-phone-how-do-they-provide-this-service/382697/1 "2006-12-03T16:44:13Z")
Occasionaly on TV I’ll see a commerical that says “To vote for Person A, text 2132 to 42321 on your cell phone.” I’ve also noticed that on late, late night TV this seems to have taken over the niche previously occupied by 900-numbers. Say I wanted to make a web-based application that could accept incoming SMS messages this way and then also respond with a SMS message. How could I do this? How do I get the “42321” in my example to route to me, regardless of the person’s cell provider? ---
**Author:** ![friedo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/8edcca/32.png) [@friedo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/friedo)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2006, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/text-1234-to-23331-on-your-cell-phone-how-do-they-provide-this-service/382697/2 "2006-12-03T16:49:46Z")
Short SMS numbers use the [Common Short Code](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_Short_Code) standard – the different cell operators agree on what ranges they’ll use, although there’s nothing that would forcibly prevent an overlap. To write your software, you’d need an incoming SMS gateway that would alert your program whenever a message is received. This service is available to businesses from most any commercial cell services provider. ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2006, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/text-1234-to-23331-on-your-cell-phone-how-do-they-provide-this-service/382697/3 "2006-12-03T18:36:06Z")
When I saw the title to this thread, I thought it was asking something else. I hope it won’t be considered a hijack if I ask my version: Occasionally on TV I’ll see a commerical that says “To vote for Person A, text 2132 to 42321 on your cell phone.” But 42321 is not a phone number, so how does it work? Is there some sort of presumption that 42321 is an AOL user name? That seems unlikely to me, because I doubt that all the cellphone companies would agree to use one single default domain among the many that are out there, and I never noticed any fine print to the effect that “Verizon only. Sprint customers send that message to [42321@yahoo.com](mailto:42321@yahoo.com)”, or some other domain. Obviously, there’s some really simple point that I don’t understand. Anyone know what detail it is that I’m missing? ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2006, 6:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/text-1234-to-23331-on-your-cell-phone-how-do-they-provide-this-service/382697/4 "2006-12-03T18:41:16Z")
**Keeve** , see the link in the post above yours re Common Short Code. 42321 is just a phone number, albeit a short one agreed between the telecom companies. ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2006, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/text-1234-to-23331-on-your-cell-phone-how-do-they-provide-this-service/382697/5 "2006-12-03T19:33:02Z")
Wow! Thanks! I had no idea!