In an effort to bridge its wireless and landline services, communications services company EMBARQ has launched a Text-to-Landline service to give their wireless customers the power to send text messages to any landline phones nationwide.

The company’s unique technology translates text messages to voice messages so it will be recognized by the landline services. The landline recipient can respond to the sender using voice messages. Recipients can also use the pre-programmed phrases like “yes,” “no” and “where are you” as their text response. The system will then notify the wireless sender that there is an incoming voice message.

Moreover, it can understand the so-called simple texting language or codes like “BRB (Be Right Back)”, “LOL (laugh out loud)” and “B4N (Bye For Now)” and translate it to full words to avoid any confusion.

To verify if the text message via sent wireless phone is delivered, EMBARQ will always send a confirmation message to the customer. With regard to price, customers need to pay the standard text message fees.

Text messaging is now an essential service for millions of mobile users around the globe. Popular in the teens and young professionals, about 160 million text messages were sent last year.

However, I doubt if this service can significantly expand the volume of text messages. It’s unique but I don’t see its value to the customers. With about 84% of the U.S. population using mobile phones at the end of this year, the need to send text messages via landline is a bit redundant.

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