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What are you talking about? Which network? We do have a few of them, you know. The only providers these days that do this are mostly small regional resellers of the major networks, i.e. they piggy-back on a major network (typically Sprint or Verizon) but provide alternative plans and charges. These piggy-backers are usually the ones that slap you with roaming charges as well. It's stupid really, as if you go with a major carrier directly you actually end up with more fair terms more often than not (how unusual is that in our corporate culture?), while the resellers make you pay more because they have to pay more in turn to use the network they're borrowing. It's not really a problem with the network though. I doubt the network cares one way or the other what the providers are charging.

[removed dupe]

Edited 2012-08-17 13:37 UTC

My bad. A Canadian friend told me it was the same in the US, when I learned that he was charged 10 cent to receive SMS on Rogers. I should mention my sources.

I have AT&T in the U.S., which qualifies as a large provider. For SMS message I have 2 choices - pay $20/month or $0.02 per message. Both choices stink. For now, I use Google Voice, but I do have reliability issues for messages coming and going (most like due to data connection, just like with twitter). No one should have to pay that much just for text messages.

Verizon charges 20 cents per text. That's why I avoid text messaging whenever possible. Especially once I got a smartphone with unlimited data. I have more ways to contact me on my phone than I can keep track, all of which are free, so text messages are the option of last resort.

Even voice calls are essentially free these days - unlimited nights, weekends, and in network calls means I rarely have any significant usage of my limited minutes.