Don't Text Me, Bro.

You can block texts via your carrier so that people can't cost you 20 cents or whatever by sending you a text. I'm pretty sure that all phone companies have this. This is what I did before the age of smartphones.

Now I still block texts, but I use Google Voice and only give people my Google voice number, never my real phone number. I receive texts through the gvoice app on my phone. Calls go through gvoice (and I can filter/redirect them). I never have to bitch about people costing me money by sending me texts :)

Because the amount of texts we were receiving (and starting to respond to) was starting to add up individually to be more expensive than getting the unlimited plan.

The way texting works in the US now, you're almost forced to buy unlimited texting if you have any friends who like to text on any sort of regular basis.

Someone, please explain the rationale behind this to me! It's such a strange concept to me. How does this make sense? How do people actually put up with _paying_ to receive SMS and voice calls?