How to save money and twitter (in India)
March 28th, 2008Are you one of those people who cringe every time you have to send an SMS to a shortcode? I am. Especially since twitter launched it’s Indian shortcode (5566511), because 3 Rs/- a twitter…ya rite.
Anyway, since we have a longcode (99015 54321) of our own and Twitter has an excellent API, we thought it’d be nice (and cheap) if we could post to twitter via Vakow!’s 10 digit non-premium number.
And here’s how:
- Create an account on Vakow! (if you haven’t done that already!)
- Visit your “Settings” page and click on “Twitter Settings” link
- Enter your Twitter login and password to connect your account.
- Add 99015 54321 as Vakow! in your phone addressbook (this step is very important)
Then onwards, use our magic twit command to post your messages to twitter. e.g. Send twit twittering via vakow.com. how cheap is that. to 99015 54321.
And because it’s a 10 digit number it only costs as per your regular SMS plan (no premium costs involved).
We’d really like to know how much money we saved you (if at all). Please do send us your feedback (if not the cheques) to twitter@vakow.com
PS: uh..oh..we’re not associated with twitter etc.
March 31st, 2008 at 10:38 am
Rahul…thanks it works… few questions
1. is there a way not putting ‘twit” before the message
2. “- via vakow.com” this will be surely be taking up my space of 140 character limit why dont you add this in the “…time…” from vakow and hyperlink the vakow (i understand you need the branding, since i am using the interface, i have no issues with it)
3. you could also use the twitzer text, de-twitzer text… do check it out
just a few thoughts…
March 31st, 2008 at 11:24 pm
Hey Moksh,
Thanks for trying it out.
1. We need a command to know that this message is meant for twitter as we’re using the same number for Vakow!
2. Yes, we found that out later. Actually, there’s no direct support for ‘from Vakow hyperlink’ in twitter API. One has to mail a fellow and figure things out. Will get that done soon.
Btw, ‘via vakow.com’ is displayed only when there’s a space available.
3. Will check twitzer out.
cheers
April 1st, 2008 at 12:37 am
this is cool
April 2nd, 2008 at 1:40 am
thanks prashant. do try and let us know.
April 2nd, 2008 at 3:31 am
Hello Vakow!
I stumbled upon this via the GetSatisfaction advertising of your’s. I must say this is quite impressive! I have a question pertaining to this: Are you considering forwarding the Tweets from a person’s Twitter friends to the said person’s cellphone via Vakow!’s number?
Since Twitter routinely shuts down our cell numbers if they can’t “see” us, we miss out on important tweets.
Thanks
April 2nd, 2008 at 9:29 am
This is a number for which city/region? Because as per my plan (on Vodafone, Karnataka circle), national sms rates differ from local sms rates.
April 11th, 2008 at 7:56 am
Guys thanks for this. Really cool. But im finding n number of ways to post a tweet… twhirl, widsets, IM etc. But getting tweets in my mobile in the right time is where most of us are stuck at. any solutions for that.
Thanks.
April 16th, 2008 at 9:43 pm
This is so cool. Amazingly simple hack. Thank you guys for the wonderful work
Cheers
Vaibhav
April 16th, 2008 at 11:36 pm
You break our hearts, Vaibhav!
It’s no hack, we’re simply using twitter’s API.
But thanks for the comment, we know what you mean.
April 30th, 2008 at 3:31 am
Will I get replies to my cell phone?
May 20th, 2008 at 11:40 pm
hi..vakow is not able to forward msgs on twitter.
I am sending my message to 99015 54321 using format: twit but its not going to twitter and this problem started since yesterday. Twitter had a 2 hour outage yesterday maybe that caused some problem for vakow.
please help
Thanks
May 31st, 2008 at 8:11 pm
Haha I see @amitu’s liking for twitter spilled over into vakow!
Prefer GPRS clients (heavy user) - but great stuff guys, you’re helping out a lot of people. Now get this info on the Twitter FAQ page so more people get using it.
June 2nd, 2008 at 7:03 am
Good work.
Why do you have to add the “via vakow” though ? Doesn’t twitter automatically add a “from ” with every message posted via a 3rd party client ?
June 2nd, 2008 at 7:16 am
@Azhar How can we get into twitter’s FAQ?
@Pratham Thanks. We don’t add ‘via Vakow!’ anymore. [Twitter doesn’t automatically add ‘from…’, one has to do things which we were not doing initially.]
June 8th, 2008 at 1:57 am
[…] loyalists in spite of their frequent downtime then also Vakow has a solution for you. you can tweet to your twitter account using Vakow and it’s money saving as Vakow has a 10 digit number 99015 54321 unlike twitter’s […]
June 14th, 2008 at 10:22 am
hi, i’m using vakow from TN. quite satisfied with it… but It seems to be down right now i cant update my status. the msg is delivered in the vakow server but my status is not getting updated. whats the problem?
July 12th, 2008 at 6:15 am
i am happy and hansome boy
August 6th, 2008 at 3:50 am
i am happier and handsomer boy
September 14th, 2008 at 11:08 pm
Hey,
2 Rs were charged for sending SMS. Twitter charges 3 Rs. Anyways do you have a Delhi number?
BTW great work!
September 21st, 2008 at 1:18 pm
Its weird that I am being charged Rs.1 for every message sent even though I have a 750 free sms plan on vodafone here in Chennai. Is it a common problem?
September 28th, 2008 at 9:23 am
great ! works brilliant!
October 27th, 2008 at 4:00 am
For the past few weeks I am unable to update Twitter vis SMS to Vakow. I am an Airtel subscriber from Bangalore. Any idea where the problem could be?
November 2nd, 2008 at 12:42 pm
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November 4th, 2008 at 5:46 pm
Hello! good site, thank you!
November 5th, 2008 at 10:24 am
god site. it was very interestingly