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Comment by josu | Hacker News Reader

The US was one of the few countries in the world where there were unlimited SMS plans. So by the time Whatsapp came around instant free messaging was already ubiquitous. This wasn't the case for most other regions, where Whatsapp actually brought free unlimited mobile messaging.

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Not sure how true this is as I had unlimited SMS in the UK in 2000. I struggled to keep that plan as the original provider got bought by O2. Luckily when it happened lots of providers provided enough SMS that was basically "unlimited". The problem for me was the cost of accessing no wap web pages.

Importantly these also usually included unlimited media messages (MMS) early on.

Flat rate plans in Europe started appearing a bit later and usually never included MMS, so it was calls and texts only, but no photos. WhatsApp changed that.

WhatsApp was a paid product to start with.

It cost ~$1 (initially a one time fee, later joiners paid annually). Depending on your SMS plan, that might be paid for with the first 10 messages you sent. There was zero additional cost to use to send a lot of messages, including pictures and group messages. This was quite different to most mobile contracts at the time

It wasn't even enforced though. Charged only after a year, but you could reinstall and get another year free.

I've used it at that time, and somehow they never managed to actually charge me (and I didn't go out of my way to avoid paying).

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