Texperts

Texperts was a UK-based mobile search service. In December 2008, Texperts was bought by the United States-based Knowledge Generation Bureau, operator of the 118 118 services, a directory services company which had also entered the SMS Any question market.[1] The service was later renamed KGBAnswers and is now defunct.

Texperts
Wholly owned subsidiary
IndustryMobile search
FoundedAugust 2003 as Re5ult Ltd
Headquarters
Cambridge
,
United Kingdom
ServicesMobile search
OwnerKnowledge Generation Bureau
WebsiteKGBAnswers.co.uk
Do Sheep Shrink in the Rain?

History

Re5ult Ltd was launched initially with a subscription-based service called 'Re5ult' on a normal mobile number. However, in August 2004 the service was launched on a premium text code and rebranded as 82ASK. In 2007, Re5ult switched phone numbers and brands again, relaunching the service as Texperts on short code 66000.

Performance

A "road test" on the question "How many people were alive compared with all who had ever lived" resulted in the service answering the question in five minutes, with the closest rival answering it in twenty-two minutes. A similar question asked for "a hotel in Ireland within half an hour of Rosslare en route to Westmeath" achieved similar results.[2]

Publications

In 2006, Texperts released the book Do Sheep Shrink in the Rain?, subtitled "Over 500 of the most outrageous questions ever asked", published by Virgin Books, ISBN 978-0753511794. The 256 page paperback is a compilation of questions received and answered by the service.

gollark: This is not very accurate, though.
gollark: In a market, if people don't want kale that much, the kale company will probably not have much money and will not be able to buy all the available fertilizer.
gollark: You can just hand out what some random people think is absolutely *needed* first, then stick the rest of everything up for public use, but that won't work either! Someone has to decide on the "needed", so you get into a planned-economy sort of situation, and otherwise... what happens when, say, the community kale farm decides they want all the remaining fertilizer, even when people don't want *that* much kale?
gollark: Planned economies, or effectively-planned-by-lots-of-voting economies, will have to implement this themselves by having everyone somehow decide where all the hundred million things need to go - and that's not even factoring in the different ways to make each thing, or the issues of logistics.
gollark: Market systems can make this work pretty well - you can sell things and use them to buy other things, and ultimately it's driven by what consumers are interested in buying.

See also

References
  1. http://www.thetelecom.co.uk/20081217/118-118-expands-with-texperts-takeover/
  2. Keegan, Victor (September 7, 2006). "The answer is just a text message away". The Guardian. Archived from the original on April 21, 2018.
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