About TXT3
TXT3 has its roots in the early days of online and mobile communication.
The project began in 1997, at a time when connecting people over the internet and mobile networks was still very different from the always-connected world we know today. Long before smartphones and modern messaging platforms, TXT3 explored simple ways of bringing people together through the emerging world of digital communication.
During the 2000s, TXT3 became particularly associated with internet-to-mobile SMS. The TXT3 service provided web and WAP-based access to SMS messaging, allowing people to send messages to mobile phones through the internet at a time when mobile texting was expensive, limited and often tied closely to individual networks. Surviving references from 2005 show txt3.net being used as a WAP SMS service, including international messaging, while archived references point to features such as user accounts, delivery reports, replyable messages and email-to-SMS functionality.
TXT3 existed across a number of domains and mobile-oriented addresses over the years, including txt3.net, txt3.co.uk and their WAP counterparts. The .co.uk domain appears in historical UK domain records from the earlier era of the project, while txt3.net is documented as an active SMS service during the mid-2000s.
The WAP service continues today at wap.txt3.net, offering a lightweight web interface, forum, and telnet access via telnet://wap.txt3.net:12300 on Tailscale.
As technology changed, so did TXT3.
What began as a way of connecting the internet with mobile phones has continued to evolve alongside the communications landscape. Today, TXT3 is once again exploring new forms of communication and community — including decentralised and open communication technologies such as Matrix.
The technology may have changed considerably since 1997, but the underlying idea has remained the same:
Connecting people.