The extraordinary history of text messaging

Posted on August 31, 2020 — 3:58 pm

History of SMS
I think we all agree that sending an SMS has many great advantages. It’s discreet, cheaper than a call, it takes less time and it can be sent and received at any time. It’s a perfect way of communication! Numbers are here to prove that we’re obsessed with texting; in 2010, 6.1 trillion SMS were sent – that’s 192 000 SMS per second!
 
2012 marks the 20th anniversary of Short Message Service; we thus collected the important milestones of the surprising history of text messages, a communication tool no one predicted to become as important as it is nowadays!
 
 
1984: A Finnish engineer named Matti Makkonnen first got the idea for the SMS concept when having lunch with two colleagues in a pizzeria located in Copenhagen, in the context of a conference about the future of mobile communications. His first idea was to develop a very simple messaging system that would work even when the recipient’s device was switched off or out of coverage area.
 
1987: The GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications) was created after 13 European countries signed an agreement to develop and deploy a common mobile telephone system across Europe - a unified, open, standard-based mobile network. Makkonnen’s concept was discussed and adopted at a worldwide GSM conference. Unfortunately for him, he did not patent his invention (and hence did not receive a penny for it…)!
 
December 1992: The first SMS ever was sent from a personal computer to a mobile phone on the Vodafone GSM network in the UK. It read “Happy Christmas
 
At that time, no one really paid attention to the potential of SMS. Operators didn’t even charge for them! In 1995, a US citizen used to send on average 0.4 text messages per month…
 
1996: Pay-as-you-go sim cards were introduced. Before that date, cellphones could only be purchased under contract, thus only by people above 18 years old but, suddenly, teenagers could also acquire mobile phones! This obviously played a major role in the increase of popularity of SMS.
 
1999: Text messages could finally be sent between different operators! This was a huge step in the increase of SMS traffic.
 
2008: Finally, 24 years after his idea, Makkonen got the The Economist magazine’s Innovation Award!
 
yuilop - Free SMSMarch 2011: The first SMS via yuilop was sent! yuilop opened a whole new area of free text communication before expanding to free voice communication!
 
2012: Two thirds of the world’s population has access to SMS (over 4 billion people), making text messaging way bigger and important than Facebook… Not bad for a 20 year old low tech tool! You can reach those 4 billion people for free! Join yuilop now!
 
Funny fact about the SMS: In 2005, Sonja Kristiansen from Norway became the fastest text message typer; she broke the record by typing a 160 characters sentence in 37.28 seconds. The exact sentence she had to type was: “The razor-toothed piranhas of the genera Serrasalmus and Pygocentrus are the most ferocious freshwater fish in the world. In reality, they seldom attack a human.” Let me guess, you want to try it too
 
Sources:

http://www.mobilepronto.org/en-us/the-history-of-sms.html

http://www.smsfun.com.au/history_of_sms.php

http://www.textually.org/textually/archives/cat_sms_a_little_history.htm

 

Follow yuilop at the Campus Party Europe 2012!

Posted on August 20, 2020 — 10:36 am

Tickets are booked and the team is already packing… Yes, yuilop will be present at the Campus Party Berlin for the whole week ! Manuela, Cherry, Barbara and Thomas will have the pleasure to attend the different activities, introduce yuilop and meet our users!
 
If you’re also going to the Campus Party 2012 make sure to look for us! We will be delighted to meet you all. How will you find us? Don’t worry, the team will be easy to spot: all will be wearing the yuilop t-shirts with the slogans “I call you”, “I meet you” and “I want you” ;)
 
Campus Party 2012 The yuilop team will be attending several workshops throughout the week but one event in particular is not to be missed. On Friday 24th 20:00 o´clock on the Pythagoras stage, make sure to attend the Night of the Apps to see our two lovely social media and country managers present yuilop on stage one advice: be very attentive to what will be said during the presentation… Who knows, you might end up getting a small prize if the team decides to organize a surprise test!
 
Barbara, our bubbly people and culture coordinator will also be attending the event in search of new talents that could join the yuilop team! So if you think you have what it takes, bring your CVs
 
Even if you are not attending the Campus Party 2012, you can still follow the yuilop team’s everyday life on site thanks to our Instagram account; we will update you on a daily basis on the team’s whereabouts, achievements and activities via pictures!
 
Heavy program isn’t it? In order not to miss anything, follow the official hashtags! : #CPEurope #yuilop #freetoall #NightOfApps

Junior Mobile App Developer (Windows Phone)

Posted on August 11, 2020 — 5:15 pm

If you want to make part of the team developing our world-class, international real.time communication product and service available to the Windows Phone 7 community, here’s your opportunity.

 

Position Challenges

  • Design: Implement Pixel Perfect UI. Smooth and responsive transitions. Increase the pleasure of using our Application.
  • Reliability:  Bugs are not welcome. Passion for code perfection is required.
  • Product:  Have Product orientation. Develop with understanding on overall understanding of the Product.
  • Performance: Nobody likes a slow Product.

Requirements

  • BS in computer science or equivalent. MS or PhD is a plus
  • Strong C# programming and debugging skills

Bonus

  • Experience with Native WP7 Interface
  • XMPP Experience
  • Network Debugging TCP and UDP

 

 

Include an answer to the following challenge with your resume

Build a WP7 Application that fetch your phone contacts and let you assign gestures to 4 contacts of your choice. After the contacts are selected they can be quickly retrieved through the selected gesture. The selected contacts and gestures must be saved and automatically loaded upon Application start.

Gesture Examples:

  • Spin Clockwise
  • Spin Counter Clockwise
  • 3 Finger Scroll Left
  • 3 Finger Scroll Right

It should scroll smoothly and look beautiful. Bonus points for readable code, best user experience and attention to detail.

 

Start date: ASAP
Location: Murcia (preferred) or Barcelona
Offer: We offer creative freedom, competitive salary including employee stock option program, as well as fun work environment with a fruit stocked kitchen and more

 

Your personal information will be incorporated in a file created and managed by Yuilop, S.L. with registered office at C/ París Nº 207 3º 1ª 08008 Barcelona, Spain, Fiscal Number B65377665. The file has been notified to the Spanish Data Protection Authority. We will use your data to assess your application of enrollment in Yuilop. You can exercise your access, modification, cancellation and opposition rights by sending your request to privacy@yuilop.com

Apply for this job

International Youth Day – All addicted to our smartphones!

Posted on August 10, 2020 — 4:21 pm

We bet that half of the people reading this sentence are doing it from their smartphone… And if you are also between 13 and 17 years old then you are part of the 82% of young people that regularly use a mobile phone.
 
Did I write young people? Guess what, the International Youth Day will be celebrated this Sunday 12th of August. We wish all of you a very happy day in advance (including the young-spirited ones!) and in order to celebrate this special day, we would like to know how our dear yuilopers behave.
 
According to a recent study realized by Common Sense Media, the use of social Medias such as Facebook and Twitter is an essential part of the modern youth’s daily life. 90% of young North Americans have used social Medias at least once in their life and 68% send an SMS every day… and if they are free, imagine how many more!
 

International Youth day in the digital communication era

 

 
The United Nations (UN) designated the 12th of August as the International Youth Day with the objective of “building a better world for young people. A global call to action to develop and engage in partnerships with and for youth”… And what could be a better way than doing it via digital and social Medias?
 
Two out of three young people declares he has his own mobile device for connecting to the internet, including smartphones, iPod Touch, iPad or iPhone. This behavior includes developing his social activities such as “checking-in” somewhere, tweeting or chatting. Also, sending SMS is mentioned as the favorite mean of digital communication in 87% of the cases, thanks to its speed.
 
 
 

Are you addicted to your smartphone?

 
1. In the metro or the bus, you are probably:
a. Reading a book
b. Looking out the window
c. Checking your Smartphone
 
2. If you need to go to an address you don’t know, how do you find it:
a. I walk senselessly until I randomly encounter it
b. I ask someone in the streets
c. I look for it on the map from my smartphone
 
3. If you like a place and you want to recommend it, you:
a. Talk about it to your friends
b. Leave a good comment in the suggestion box
c. “Check-in” and leave a positive comment from your smartphone
 
If you’ve answered “C” to any of these 3 questions, then you probably are
 

Sources:
ONU, International Youth Day
Social Media, Social Life: How Teens View Their Digital Lives

 

Communications & PR Manager

Posted on August 8, 2020 — 9:36 pm

You will be the voice of yuilop – the important social glue between our revolutionary product and the end-customer!

Your objective is to build awareness the yuilop brand and story among key audiences including users, partners, press and other industry influencers.
You ensure yuilop receives coverage in the Europe (UK, Germany, Spain, etc.), US and LatAm for our free communication service, as well as our story and vision.

 

What you’ll do:

  • Design, develop, and execute our Communications  strategy
  • Build awareness of yuilop and shape and maintain our public image by creating a unique wording and story
  • Write, review and compile media materials (i.e. press releases, corporate material)
  • Coordinate and answer media requests
  • Find smart ways to „spread the word“ about yuilop (viral, mouth-to-mouth, etc.)
  • Help with marketing by writing and editing newsletters, website content and announcements
  • Work closely with CEO & CSO, though having project-ownership & responsibility
  • take care of communication with yuilop and share what’s happening at yuilop with the world

What we look for:

  • 4+ years working experiences as a Blogger ,editorial staff, writer with community management experience
  • Bachelor or Graduate studies in: Journalism, Media Studies, Communications, English or Marketing.
  • Perfect ability to operate in the social media „milky-way“…. We’re looking for a media junkies with personal expertise from among these channels
  • Passion for Social Media, PR, Networking, Blogging.
  • High level of general knowledge of the mobile and internet industry.
  • Superior knowledge of and experience with all relevant social media tools.
  • Working experience with WordPress.
  • Close to Native English
  • Ability to work both independently and as a team player, while recognizing the nature of a fast-growing startup.
  • A network within the mobile and internet industry is a plus.

 

Start date: ASAP
Location: Barcelona
Offer: We offer creative freedom, professional growth, competitive salary plus bonus, as well as fun work environment as part of a young and very talented team in Barcelona city centre with a fruit stocked kitchen and more

Your personal information will be incorporated in a file created and managed by Yuilop, S.L. with registered office at C/ París Nº 207 3º 1ª 08008 Barcelona, Spain, Fiscal Number B65377665. The file has been notified to the Spanish Data Protection Authority. We will use your data to assess your application of enrollment in Yuilop. You can exercise your access, modification, cancellation and opposition rights by sending your request to privacy@yuilop.com

 

Senior DBA (MySQL & Redis)

Posted on August 4, 2020 — 2:46 pm

yuilop is looking for an experienced DBA to be part of our tech tribe!

If you want to be part of our data group are looking for a challenging environment and like to be surrounded by the best talent , this offer has your name!

Job Responsibilities

  • you will be responsible for the implementation, deployment and development of our database.
  • you will ensure the fine optimization and performance tuning
  • you will develop automatic tools to control the maintenance of our datawarehousing

Job Requirements

  • At least 5 years of experience as MySQL DBA
  • Proficient with database performance strategies
  • Knowledge of TCP/IP Tuning
  • Problem solver “Can Do” approach
  • Fluent English
  • Experience with Key Value Databases

Bonus Points

  • You have experience with telecom/messaging Back-ends
  • You are a contributor to open source projects and like “hacker culture” .

 

Start date: ASAP
Location: Barcelona or Murcia
Offer: We offer creative freedom, competitive salary including employee stock option program, as well as fun work environment in Barcelona city center with a fruit stocked kitchen and more

 

 

Your personal information will be incorporated in a file created and managed by Yuilop, S.L. with registered office at C/ París Nº 207 3º 1ª 08008 Barcelona, Spain, Fiscal Number B65377665. The file has been notified to the Spanish Data Protection Authority. We will use your data to assess your application of enrollment in Yuilop. You can exercise your access, modification, cancellation and opposition rights by sending your request to privacy@yuilop.com

Apply for this job

Principal VoIP Software Engineer (Java & SIP)

Posted on August 3, 2020 — 4:24 pm

 

yuilop is looking for a Principal VoIP Software Engineer, that will coordinate the creation of a ground breaking Voice Over IP (VoIP) mobile service.

We are a team of engineers involved in the development of a revolutionary mobile product and if you like to work surrounded of innovation and determination you should join us!

 

Job Responsibilities

  • 3-6 years proven domain expertise in developing software of Voice related technologies .
  • Communication skills in working and driving discussions with teams, both engineering and marketing.
  • Java application software development knowledge
  • Demonstrated system and solution level focus while owning and understanding few product components/features

 

Job Requirements

  • BS in Telecomunication or Computer Information Systems, or equivalent. MS or PhD is a plus
  • Knowledge of VoIP Protocols SIP, RTP and SRTP
  • Knowledge of TCP/IP – UDP/IP and experience with network programming
  • Experience building and scaling distributed, highly available systems

 

Bonus Points
You are a contributor to open source projects and like “hacker culture”

 

Fast & Functions Challenge (Java or Erlang)

Write code that implements the described functions to be executed as fast as possible:

  • Build a function that given a list of Integers in the range [-65000,65000], the function

returns true if any subset of the list summed is equal to zero. False otherwise.

Example:

■ [0, 1, 2, -3] returns true. As 1+2+(-3)==0.

■ [1, 2, 3, -8] returns false. As no subset summed is equal 0.

■ [1, 4, 5, 2, -3] returns true.

 

  • Build a function that given a list of Integers pairs in the range [-65000,65000], that represents {X, Y} Coordinates in a Plane. The function returns the two closest pairs.

○ Example:

■ [{0,0}, {1,20}, {5, 2}] returns [{0,0}, {5, 2}]

■ [{-10,10}, {1,5}, {4, 3}] returns [{1,5}, {4, 3}]

 

Start date: ASAP
Location: Barcelona – First Mobile World Capital!
Offer: We offer creative freedom, competitive salary including employee stock option program, as well as fun work environment in Barcelona city center with a fruit stocked kitchen and more.

 

Your personal information will be incorporated in a file created and managed by Yuilop, S.L. with registered office at C/ París Nº 207 3º 1ª 08008 Barcelona, Spain, Fiscal Number B65377665. The file has been notified to the Spanish Data Protection Authority. We will use your data to assess your application of enrollment in Yuilop. You can exercise your access, modification, cancellation and opposition rights by sending your request to privacy@yuilop.com

Apply for this job

Senior VoIP Software Engineer (Java & SIP)

Posted on August 3, 2020 — 2:36 pm

 

If you are passionate over new technologies and spend most of your time developing code you should join us!

We are a team of engineers involved in the development of a revolutionary mobile product.

 

 

Job Responsibilities

  • 2-4 years proven domain expertise in developing software of Voice related technologies - VoIP.
  • Communication skills in working and driving discussions with teams, both engineering and marketing.
  • Very Good Java application software development  knowledge
  • Demonstrated system and solution level focus while owning and understanding few product components/features

 

Job Requirements

  • BS in Telecomunication or Computer Information Systems, or equivalent. MS or PhD is a plus
  • Knowledge of VoIP Protocols SIP, RTP and SRTP
  • Knowledge of TCP/IP – UDP/IP and experience with network programming
  • Experience building and scaling distributed, highly available systems

 

Bonus Points
You are a contributor to open source projects and like “hacker culture”

 

Fast & Functions Challenge (Java or Erlang)

Write code that implements the described functions to be executed as fast as possible:

  • Build a function that given a list of Integers in the range [-65000,65000], the function

returns true if any subset of the list summed is equal to zero. False otherwise.

Example:

■ [0, 1, 2, -3] returns true. As 1+2+(-3)==0.

■ [1, 2, 3, -8] returns false. As no subset summed is equal 0.

■ [1, 4, 5, 2, -3] returns true.

 

  • Build a function that given a list of Integers pairs in the range [-65000,65000], that represents {X, Y} Coordinates in a Plane. The function returns the two closest pairs.

○ Example:

■ [{0,0}, {1,20}, {5, 2}] returns [{0,0}, {5, 2}]

■ [{-10,10}, {1,5}, {4, 3}] returns [{1,5}, {4, 3}]

 

Start date: ASAP
Location: Barcelona – First Mobile World Capital!
Offer: We offer creative freedom, competitive salary including employee stock option program, as well as fun work environment in Barcelona city center with a fruit stocked kitchen and more.

 

 

Your personal information will be incorporated in a file created and managed by Yuilop, S.L. with registered office at C/ París Nº 207 3º 1ª 08008 Barcelona, Spain, Fiscal Number B65377665. The file has been notified to the Spanish Data Protection Authority. We will use your data to assess your application of enrollment in Yuilop. You can exercise your access, modification, cancellation and opposition rights by sending your request to privacy@yuilop.com

Apply for this job

Free calls worldwide! yuilop takes a giant step towards full communication freedom

Posted on August 2, 2020 — 2:55 pm

If you’re already a yuilop user you know the many benefits of our communication app. You didn’t think it could get any better? Believe it or not, we made it happen - introducing free calls worldwide! The latest version of the app (version 1.5 on iOS and 1.6 on Android) is ready to be used on your smartphone and/or tablet!
 
The entire yuilop team worked really hard to make this happen and we are all very excited to share the news with you. Wondering what´s new in the latest yuilop? Let’s have a look
 
As yuilop user and reader of our blog you already know the unique features yuilop offers in comparison to other comparable VoIP apps; endless hours of chatting via yuilop, free high quality phone calls to yuilop users and free messages to 110 countries using Energy points. yuilop is THE app which manages all your communications.
 
free calls worldwide

And now ladies and gentlemen, what we’ve all been waiting for: yuilop is proud to present the launch of its full voice version! yuilop has taken the next step towards full communication freedom. From now on, you can not only you send free text messages to any phone worldwide, you also are able to call your contacts for free! All you need is to first unlock the voice calls feature using 15 Energy points. No need to restrain yourself to text messaging anymore; just grab your phone and tell your best friend who lives abroad all details of your weekend. You can stay hours on the phone using your Energy points –for free!
 
yuilop is even more user friendly than it used to be thanks to the implementation of the brand new colour code. We kept it simple: yuilop’s signature colour, green, for your yuilop contacts and dark red for the others. Keep it in mind! It means free unlimited calls and texts to your green contacts, and free calls and texts using Energy points to your dark red contacts using Energy.
 
Download this latest version on your Android or iOS device now!
 
We hope you make the best out of the new features created for you! With yuilop, you never pay for a phone call again!
 
For further information about this version or for any other queries, please always feel free to contact our team and leave us a comment.