Multimedia Messaging Service
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Multimedia Messaging Service (MMS) is a standard way to send messages that include
multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms such as text, audio, images, animations, or video into a single interactive presentation, in contrast to tradition ...
content to and from a
mobile phone A mobile phone, cellular phone, cell phone, cellphone, handphone, hand phone or pocket phone, sometimes shortened to simply mobile, cell, or just phone, is a portable telephone that can make and receive calls over a radio frequency link whil ...
over a cellular network. Users and providers may refer to such a message as a PXT, a picture message, or a multimedia message. The MMS standard extends the core
SMS Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...
(Short Message Service) capability, allowing the exchange of text messages greater than 160 characters in length. Unlike text-only SMS, MMS can deliver a variety of media, including up to forty seconds of video, one image, a
slideshow A slide show (slideshow) is a presentation of a series of still images ( slides) on a projection screen or electronic display device, typically in a prearranged sequence. The changes may be automatic and at regular intervals or they may be manu ...
of multiple images, or audio. The most common use involves sending
photographs A photograph (also known as a photo, image, or picture) is an image created by light falling on a photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor, such as a CCD or a CMOS chip. Most photographs are now created ...
from camera-equipped handsets. Media companies have utilized MMS on a commercial basis as a method of delivering news and entertainment content, and retailers have deployed it as a tool for delivering scannable coupon codes, product images, videos, and other information. The 3GPP and
WAP WAP or Wap may refer to: Music * "WAP" (song), a 2020 song by Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion Organizations * Weatherization Assistance Program, for US energy costs * Western Australia Party, a political party founded in 2016 * Western A ...
groups fostered the development of the MMS standard, which is now continued by the
Open Mobile Alliance OMA SpecWorks, previously the Open Mobile Alliance (OMA) is a standards organization which develops open, international technical standards for the mobile phone industry. It is a nonprofit Non-governmental organization (NGO), not a formal governme ...
(OMA). Multimedia messaging service was built using the technology of
SMS Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...
messaging, first developed in 1984 as a captive technology which enabled service providers to "collect a fee every time anyone snaps a photo." The commercial introduction of MMS started in March 2002. Between 2010 and 2013, MMS traffic in the U.S. increased by 70% from 57 billion to 96 billion messages sent. This is due in part to the wide adoption of
smartphone A smartphone is a portable computer device that combines mobile telephone and computing functions into one unit. They are distinguished from feature phones by their stronger hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, whic ...
s.


Technical description

MMS messages are delivered in a different way from SMS. The first step is for the sending device to encode the multimedia content in a fashion similar to sending a
MIME Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) is an Internet standard that extends the format of email messages to support text in character sets other than ASCII, as well as attachments of audio, video, images, and application programs. Message ...
message (MIME content formats are defined in the MMS Message Encapsulation specification). The message is then forwarded to the carrier's MMS
store and forward Store and forward is a telecommunications technique in which information is sent to an intermediate station where it is kept and sent at a later time to the final destination or to another intermediate station. The intermediate station, or node in ...
server, known as the MMSC (Multimedia Messaging Service Centre). If the receiver is on a carrier different from the sender, then the MMSC acts as a relay, and forwards the message to the MMSC of the recipient's carrier using the Internet. Once the recipient's MMSC has received a message, it first determines whether the receiver's handset is "MMS capable" or not. If it supports the standards for receiving MMS, the content is extracted and sent to a temporary storage server with an
HTTP The Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) is an application layer protocol in the Internet protocol suite model for distributed, collaborative, hypermedia information systems. HTTP is the foundation of data communication for the World Wide Web, ...
front-end. An SMS "control message" containing the URL of the content is then sent to the recipient's handset to trigger the receiver's
WAP WAP or Wap may refer to: Music * "WAP" (song), a 2020 song by Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion Organizations * Weatherization Assistance Program, for US energy costs * Western Australia Party, a political party founded in 2016 * Western A ...
browser to open and receive the content from the embedded URL. Several other messages are exchanged to indicate the status of the delivery attempt. Before delivering content, some MMSCs also include a conversion service that will attempt to modify the multimedia content into a format suitable for the receiver. This is known as "content adaptation". If the receiver's handset is not MMS capable, the message is usually delivered to a web-based service from where the content can be viewed from a normal internet browser. The URL for the content is usually sent to the receiver's phone in a normal text message. This behavior is usually known as a "legacy experience" since content can still be received by the user. The method for determining whether a handset is MMS capable is not specified by the standards. A database is usually maintained by the operator, and in it each mobile phone number is marked as being associated with a legacy handset or not. This method is unreliable, however, because customers can independently change their handsets, and many of these databases are not updated dynamically. MMS does not utilize operator-maintained "data" plans to distribute multimedia content; they are used only if the user clicks links inside the message.
E-mail Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a method of exchanging messages ("mail") between people using electronic devices. Email was thus conceived as the electronic ( digital) version of, or counterpart to, mail, at a time when "mail" meant ...
and web-based gateways to the MMS system are common. On the reception side, the content servers can typically receive service requests both from WAP and normal HTTP browsers, so delivery via the web is simple. For sending from external sources to handsets, most carriers allow a
MIME Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME) is an Internet standard that extends the format of email messages to support text in character sets other than ASCII, as well as attachments of audio, video, images, and application programs. Message ...
encoded message to be sent to the receiver's phone number using a special e-mail address combining the recipient's public phone number and a special domain name, which is typically carrier-specific.


Challenges

There are some challenges with MMS that do not exist with SMS: *
Content adaptation Content adaptation is the action of transforming content to adapt to device capabilities. Content adaptation is usually related to mobile devices, which require special handling because of their limited computational power, small screen size, and ...
: Multimedia content created by one brand of MMS phone may not be entirely compatible with the capabilities of the recipient's MMS phone. In the MMS architecture, the recipient MMSC is responsible for providing for ''content adaptation'' (e.g., image resizing, audio codec transcoding, etc.), if this feature is enabled by the mobile network operator. When content adaptation is supported by a network operator, its MMS subscribers enjoy compatibility with a larger network of MMS users than would otherwise be available. * Distribution lists: Current MMS specifications do not include distribution lists nor methods by which large numbers of recipients can be conveniently addressed, particularly by content providers, called '' Value-added service providers'' (VASPs) in 3GPP. Since most SMSC vendors have adopted
FTP The File Transfer Protocol (FTP) is a standard communication protocol used for the transfer of computer files from a server to a client on a computer network. FTP is built on a client–server model architecture using separate control and data ...
as an ad-hoc method by which large distribution lists are transferred to the SMSC prior to being used in a bulk-messaging SMS submission, it is expected that MMSC vendors will also adopt FTP. *
Bulk messaging Bulk messaging is the dissemination of large numbers of SMS messages for delivery to mobile phone terminals. It is used by media companies, banks and other enterprises (for marketing and fraud control) and consumer brands for a variety of purpose ...
: The flow of ''peer-to-peer'' MMS messaging involves several over-the-air transactions that become inefficient when MMS is used to send messages to large numbers of subscribers, as is typically the case for VASPs. For example, when one MMS message is submitted to a very large number of recipients, it is possible to receive a ''delivery report'' and ''read-reply report'' for each and every recipient. Future MMS specification work is likely to optimize and reduce the transactional overhead for the bulk-messaging case. * Handset configuration: Unlike SMS, MMS requires a number of handset parameters to be set. Poor handset configuration is often blamed as the first point of failure for many users. Service settings are sometimes preconfigured on the handset, but mobile operators are now looking at new device management technologies as a means of delivering the necessary settings for data services (MMS, WAP, etc.) via
over-the-air programming Over-the-air programming (OTA programming) refers to various methods of distributing new software, configuration settings, and even updating encryption keys to devices like mobile phones, set-top boxes, electric cars or secure voice communication ...
(OTA). *
WAP Push Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) is a technical standard for accessing information over a mobile wireless network. A WAP browser is a web browser for mobile devices such as mobile phones that use the protocol. Introduced in 1999, WAP achieve ...
: Few mobile network operators offer direct connectivity to their MMSCs for content providers. This has resulted in many content providers using WAP push as the only method available to deliver 'rich content' to mobile handsets. WAP push enables 'rich content' to be delivered to a handset by specifying the URL (via binary SMS) of a pre-compiled MMS, hosted on a content provider's web server. A consequence is that the receiver who pays WAP per kb or minute (as opposed to a flat monthly fee) pays for receiving the MMS, as opposed to only paying for sending one, and also paying a different rate. Although the standard does not specify a maximum size for a message, 300 kB and 600 kB are the recommended sizes used by networks for compatibility with MMS 1.2 and MMS 1.3 devices respectively. The limit for the first generation of MMS was 50 kB.


Interfaces

* MM1: the 3GPP interface between MMS User Agent and MMS Center (MMSC, the combination of the MMS Relay & Server) * MM2: the 3GPP interface between MMS Relay and MMS Server * MM3: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and external servers * MM4: the 3GPP interface between different MMSCs * MM5: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and HLR * MM6: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and user databases * MM7: the 3GPP interface between MMS VAS applications and MMSC * MM8: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and the billing systems * MM9: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and an
online charging system Online charging system (OCS) is a system allowing a communications service provider to charge their customers, in real time, based on service usage. Architecture Event based charging An event-based charging function (EBCF) is used to charge event ...
* MM10: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and a message service control function * MM11: the 3GPP interface between MMSC and an external transcoder


See also

*
Enhanced Messaging Service Enhanced Messaging Service (EMS) was a cross-industry collaboration between Samsung, Ericsson, Motorola, Siemens and Alcatel among others, which provided an application-level extension to Short Message Service (SMS) for cellular phones available on ...
(EMS) *
Rich Communication Services Rich Communication Services (RCS) is a communication protocol between mobile telephone carriers and between phone and carrier, aiming at replacing SMS messages with a text-message system that is richer, provides phonebook polling (for service dis ...
(RCS) *
Mobile marketing Mobile marketing is a multi-channel online marketing technique focused at reaching a specific audience on their smartphones, feature phones, tablets, or any other related devices through websites, e-mail, SMS and MMS, social media, or mobile app ...
*
Short code codes, or short numbers, are short digit sequences, significantly shorter than telephone numbers, that are used to address messages in the Multimedia Messaging System (MMS) and short message service (SMS) systems of mobile network operators. I ...
*
Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL ()) is a World Wide Web Consortium recommended Extensible Markup Language (XML) markup language to describe multimedia presentations. It defines markup for timing, layout, animations, visual t ...


References


External links

* * * * {{Telecommunications 3GPP standards Mobile telecommunication services Mobile telecommunications standards Open Mobile Alliance standards Telecommunications-related introductions in 2002