MessagEase

by Antonio Wells Oct 19, 2010 8:00 AM – 32 Comments

Install

MessagEase. Experience the fastest keyboard for your Android! It has fewer, larger keys and a patented arrangement optimized for speed. You’ll text faster & more accurately one-handed, with one thumb or finger. Spend a few minutes to play and practice to find out, as 1000s have. Voice-rec coming. Latest version: 1.0.4 (for Android version 2.1 and higher)

Price: Free

AndroidTapp.com Android App Review:

Pros & Cons:

Cons

Steep and new learning curve
Extremely counter-productive and not intuitive
Slows typing than offering speed benefits
Does not offer word prediction or spacing
Lacks voice input for Android 2.1+ phones

Features & Ease of Use:

Sorry folks, we usually try to review the better Android apps as MessageEase keyboard is not one of them. A significant value to our service developers often share with us is that our reviews are fair and accurate, thus offering consultation on ways to improve their software. We feel there is room for improvement with this app.

MessagEase claims to be one of the fastest keyboards for Android and this is simply not true. There is a steep learning curve as common letters like; a, n, i, h, o, r, t, e and s are large and can simply be tapped. Whereas letters like v, l, and x have to be swiped downward. Others like q, u, and p have to be swiped diagonally from the center up…. you get it… well maybe you won’t as you would seriously have to watch a video just to learn how to type with the keyboard.

Besides the new learning curve, other serious issues with the app does not offer predictive text (which tends to be the core ingredient of faster virtual keyboards). Each letter has to manually be stroked. Moreover the placement of the keys are strange unlike the familiar QWERTY arrangement. Lastly, since this keyboard is for Android 2.1+ phones it even lacks the Voice Input to speak text as that will be sanity-salvation from this super slow-mo keyboard.

I hate to keep beating up on the app but here’s the ultimate worst use case. Say you have the keyboard enabled, you’re toughing it out and your buddy asks for your phone to search the Web or something that requires text input. They pause and stare trying to figure out how to type something… anything… you have to either teach them how to use the keyboard or switch to the default.

: MessagEase Keyboard

: MessagEase Keyboard How To’s

: MessagEase Keyboard Setup

AndroidTapp.com Rating

AndroidTapp.com Rating! (2.0 out of 5)

Should you Download MessagEase? No! If you’re looking for a virtual keyboard to speed up your typing hopefully you have Swype pre-installed on your phone else try SlideIt or SwiftKey.

Tags: Android App, Android Apps, Android Keyboard, AndroidTapp.com App Review, MessagEase, On-Screen Keyboard, Virtual Keyboard

Categorised in: Tools

32 Comments

By Jimmy_B on October 19, 2010 at 8:29 am:

The input method was originally developed by some university in the U.S.

And it REALLY WAS faster. In time when the first Palm / Cassiopeia / etc. PDAs used a stylus to enter letter by letter in a stupid glyph alphabet… The windows PDAs could display a tiny keyboard, which was a pain in the a** to use…

The learning curve of this method was quite high, but the result was worth it. They only needed 9 fields, instead of this tiny keyboard… And you where fast (really!).

But the guys of this app did mess it up anyway. The method was developed for SWYPING, not for tapping. You had to stay with your stylus in the center of the 9-field-cluster… and just swype around… The here mixture of swyping and tapping is just not working this well as swyping alone.

CU

Reply
- By Sherry Williams on October 19, 2010 at 11:09 am:
  
  MessagEase has always used a combination of taps and slides, never slides alone. Taps for the most frequent and slides for the less frequent and other special characters.
  
  It has thousands of users on Palm Pocket PCs, iPhones, and now Androids.
  
  Like any innovation, it’s always resisted by people comfortable with status quo. But those with intellectual curiosity, patience and perseverance will be rewarded with a faster, really faster method.
  
  It’s your choice!
  
  Reply
By Corey on October 19, 2010 at 9:54 am:

I think you mean to say that the learning curve is shallow, not steep. Shallow means that it is slow to learn, which seems to be your complaint; steep means that the learning occurs quickly.

It only took me a couple days to get faster with messagease than the standard keyboard in portrait mode; I’d be interested to see a review that takes more than 5 minutes of trying.

Reply
By Eli Weitz on October 19, 2010 at 9:53 pm:

I believe that Antonio missed some important considerations that others have picked up on- yes, it takes more than most everyday apps to learn the new wrinkles- but this is not an everyday app & it pays great rewards in the end.

Above, Jimmy said it is well worth learning & the speed of having every letter, & character, symbol, & number readily at hand is the real benefit. With all due respect, it sounds like Antonio didn’t take much time to get accustomed to the new text-entry paradigm & the claim about probs arising fm lending a friend your phone is not well advised- the OS naturally has the ability to just swipe on the contact list & scroll by itself, so it shouldn’t be all that hard for a user just borrowing the phone to scroll down to an entry & yes, you might want to change to another ‘Input Method’ for keybd implementation- but that is fairly quick & easy on the droid platform; so the prob mentioned w/lending the phone is more of a red-herring than a real problem that can’t easily be handled & natively by the Android OS.

Having close proximity & quick access to _ALL_ (types of) characters is well worth it- it took me a while to learn how to touch type on my computer kbd; but now I do just fine & on my Droid, the added benefit of not having to switch to a new screen for letters & numbers & special characters, as is needed w/the native app & even SmartKeybd Pro… is a big benefit in my eyes (I bought SKP, & used it until now). Once you get used to the new paradigm, it is faster & easier & certainly worth it.

The fact that you can also control the cursor w/gestures right & left on the Spacebar is absolutely great. I didn’t get the Droid X, despite the totally cool tech-sexy factor, b/c DX has no kybd & while playing w/the DX in the Verizon store I had many probs w/trying to re-orient the cursor position when I made a typo & needed to make corrections; so I got the Droid2 (editing w/backspace key & cursor control of ME is so much quicker, ‘cuz every tool is literally right there at your fingertips, on the same screen). I love my D2, but ease of access & simpler interaction of ME is great- for example, inserting the apostrophe when typing “John’s app” is sooo much easier w/MessagEase.

Just swiping up & diagonally right fm the letter E gives you the needed apostrophe within a few centimeters of where your finger was most recently & you don’t have to switch into another screen w/diff sets of characters- it is all at hand w/ME and _that_ is a big improvement over even Smart Keyboard Pro

More features seem likely to be available in the future, that were present in the Palm version of ME & I imagine that the developer will be looking to incorporate them on the Android platform as well.

Give ME a good chance & you’ll get the great results of easily accessed text entry that’ll improve your typing speed; & the cursor control makes editing even easier; so it is all good. Enjoy!

The rest is just an issue of getting used to tapping in some cases, or circling, or swipe & return for others.

I used this app on my old Palm PDAs & even though that was yrs ago, now that I got my D2, I had to get used to diff ways to deal w/using apps & managing data, it took a long time, but it is worth it… & so it is w/those who need to learn how to use the new keyboard that makes MessagEase so handy….

The rest is very straightforward; no complex settings, or choices. Just type & go on your way a lot easier- yes, you have to learn the new system of entry, but as others have said, all innovation requires an adjustment.

I’m sure that once Antonio gets used to ME more, he will see that ease of access & simpler interaction w/switching between letters, numbers, & all sorts of symbols. I recommend people to download the game that trains you to use ME, I used it when I 1st got ME, just as I got Typing Tutor to learn how to type when I got into computers… & that seems to have worked out well…

The developer is a responsive person, & is open to helping others better use his apps & he also listens to suggestions. Also, the opening screen has a lot of good instruction w/how-to’s for all of the features. Good documentatio is important & together w/responsiveness of developer, ease of use of the app after whatever the learning curve may be called – makes it very much worth the effort. Even after yrs of not using ME, I got right back into using ME.

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on October 20, 2010 at 2:44 pm:
  
  @Eli, I spent nearly a week with the keyboard in total frustration. On many occasions I simply had to switch to the default keyboard when handing the phone to friends because teaching someone how to type when they want to do a simple google search or get directions is simply unacceptable. Every interaction in Android is not just a simple scroll or swipe away… you have to input text. Let’s be realistic here:
  
  Buddy: Hey dude, let me see your phone to get the nearest Starbucks
  
  Me: Here.
  
  Buddy: What’s this, how do I type “starbucks”? It keeps typing “starooohs” :confused:
  
  Me: Oh… I’m sorry, with this keyboard you can tap the main letters but you have to swipe from the middle out to the right for b, middle up for u, middle then left for c and start from h and left for k
  
  Buddy: [blank stare followed by] well how do you just speak it, I just wanna find Starbucks
  
  Me: Oh… this keyboard doesn’t have that
  
  Buddy: Dude you’re kidding me right… and you’re the guru of Android apps worldwide huh? [sarcastic remark]
  
  Me: Let me just switch to the normal keyboard
  
  The keyboard in its current form is counter-productive and not suitable for everyone. So the comparison of learning to type on a PC keyboard is not applicable here as you can go to any keyboard and start typing, you don’t however go and learn how to use the keyboard then type.
  
  Lastly, @Corey was interested in a review where typing a sentence literally took 5 minutes, it can when you’re looking for letters, figuring out strokes, and jumping to the app Help section to figure stuff out. I would like to take that challenge further though. For those who have conquered the learning curve and claim this keyboard to be faster I would like to see a video of this. Throw it up on YouTube for benchmarking.
  
  I would still guarantee Swype, SlideIt or SwiftKey are way faster as MessagEase misses core ingredients for speedy virtual keyboard input. Hopefully these ingredients can be incorporated into the app. I personally see the potential of the app, but recommending it to more than 35,000+ folks that read this blog daily cannot be respectively done at the moment.
  
  Reply
  - By Sherry Williams on October 20, 2010 at 5:55 pm:
    
    Dear Antonio,
    
    There are several videos about MessagEase, some done independently: Please go to exideas.com and visit their intro>videos section.
    
    Also their Yahoo group has thousands of users.
    
    Reply
  - By Sherry Williams on October 20, 2010 at 5:59 pm:
    
    in particular, please see the video of Matthiew Miller’s review of MessagEase on ZDnet; there is a link at exideas page under intro> videos> ZDNet Demos MessagEase on the iPhone
    
    Hope you find that interesting.
    
    Matthiew Miller has been using MessagEase for several years now, and never complained as much as you do!
    
    Reply
- By Jason Norment on October 21, 2010 at 11:38 am:
  
  Can I chime in and say that the usage of a virtual keyboard on any Android device is a matter of choice? I actually like SlideIT better than Swype. Some people use the standard keyboard. Even Vlingo has their own version of the keyboard (of course integrated with their own voice input option). I can say without a doubt that after trying MessageEase, it simply isn’t for me. I didn’t see any benefit in using it. In fact, I had a lot of the same issues that Antonio did. On the other hand, it’s obvious that many users have found great productivity and efficiency using this app. More power to you all! Until I gather up the nerve to buy SlideIT, I’ll continue to use the Vlingo keyboard for now. Maybe it’s the dark color that makes it easy on the eyes for me
  
  Reply
By Eli Weitz on October 20, 2010 at 10:00 pm:

@Antonio,

First I want to say that I do not intend to pile on w/my diff opinion here-
I did go out of my way to say ‘misguided’ rather than something more inflammatory… I just want a very good app, that has a learning curve to get a fair shake in the world of reviews….

If you truly took 5 mins to write just a handful of lines, _including _ the time needed to look up stuff in the in-app documentation, then I would like to float the idea that you did not ‘do your homework’ long enough before doing the trial on which you based your review. The vendor tells us of a learning curve up front & provides in-app help files, & videos.

It seems that by evaluating the functionality of the app before you took the time to get past the stipulated learning curve, it is like writing a review on a replacement cell-phone battery- to discuss the talk time the battery affords, but without being sure to charge it fully before starting the test….

I respectfully submit that in order to see if ME performed as promised, you might have taken more time to familiarize yourself w/the admittedly new paradigm for virtual keyboard text entry before putting your ‘microscope’ to ME’s functionality for the purpose of reviewing the app- the dev. DID warn in advance & it is much diff fm other kbd’s… so to be a bit more open minded, you might have said something like ‘I found the learning curve to be too daunting & therefore didn’t have a chance to run it thru it’s paces…’

We know there is a big learning curve, & the issue is whether or not it is worth it. Many have used MessagEase on many platforms & believe that it is worth it, so it is not a stretch for me to say that it would have been reasonable for you to put in more time, i.e. playing the game so you could have familiarized yourself more w/the new paradigm before publishing a review (I used the game to teach me the system & even tho I haven’t been able to use ME on my recent Palm devices for years (because Palm updated their OS) – when I found ME for the droid available just this week, I was able to take to it like a duck to water-

You may say that this only means that I got into it b/c I liked the app; but consider… how long most people will be two-finger typists on their computer keyboard before they become 10 finger touch typists. It took me at least 6mos & the Typing Tutor program, which included a game….

So let’s just take a step back & revisit the situation. The real issue here is if people are going to be willing to invest the time to get used to a completely diff paradigm for virtual keyboards (on a droid device), to reap the benefits of the elegant & thoughtful design… which incorporates letters, numbers, punctuation, & extended characters all in close proximity- to enable rapid & convenient text entry.

So now, the only thing is ‘will people be willing to give it a fair trial’ after reading your review – & I think that based on your less than complete job of doing your ‘homework’ for a new app, because it _is_ a completely new paradigm for text entry -before giving it an unfavorable review…

many might not be willing to give it a try…. It is a brand new paradigm for most people & in the interest of open-mindedness –

it would be fair to judge whether or not the learning curve is worth it once one has had the chance to get properly used to the app, so they can fairly say… “it did, or didn’t do what it says it does”.

Set Soapbox Mode = OFF Eli

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on October 21, 2010 at 8:00 am:
  
  @Eli. Wow, attack my credibility. I assume that’s the only viable option in a losing debate. OK, let’s assume I did not do my ‘homework’ as you continue to put in single quotes. I’ll just refute with facts because opinions are just that, everyone is entitled to them.
  
  We would not be the world’s leader in Android app reviews if we didn’t do our ‘homework’ with evaluating apps. Again, that’s “world’s” leader, look that up and see what you come back with. We have compiled a list of thousands of testimonials from software developers and firms that say our reviews are fair and accurate. Even those that receive a negative review use it in a positive way to improve their app, thus making it more valuable to the consumer.
  
  Let’s take a look at two of a few thousand case studies:
  
  1. The app A2B received a poor review on AndroidTapp, at the time there were some things the developer was poorly handling in user expectation. We pointed these things out. The very next app they created Key Ring was and is a winner as it factored in not only great and convenient functionalty but managed user expectations and is not a top downloaded Android app.
  
  2. ProOnGo received a medicore review on AndroidTapp. We pointed out areas of improvement and the potential we see with the app. Since they have be working hard and not only corrected the flaws but added new and better functionality. Now their app is recommended as a “Must Have App” for any professional. Even Handmark considers it highly and included it in their Sprint ID Small Business pack.
  
  Back to the facts already stated about the app.
  
  Steep and new learning curve (TRUE)
  Extremely counter-productive and not intuitive (TRUE)
  Slows typing than offering speed benefits (TRUE)
  Does not offer word prediction or spacing (TRUE)
  Lacks voice input for Android 2.1+ phones (TRUE)
  
  I’ve seen claims of 35-60 word per minute capable with this keyboard. I personally think it’s an exaggeration, but I would love to see it. Every video I’ve seen were max typing speeds equivalent to the default Android keyboard. I challenge anyone to please show me that MessagEase is “…the fastest keyboard for your Android!”. I would like to see MessagEase surpass Swype speeds to take the crown in the Guinness World Book of World Records, as the latter app claims to be the fastest, it proved it, and through personal experience I agree.
  
  Bottomline, it is not practical for a typical user to want to continue to use the app past the learning curve… only the smaller percentage do. And the max benefits they receive are possibly slightly faster WPM speeds than the default keyboard for 2-4 weeks of training. When a person could pick up Swype or SlideIt after 10 minutes of learning it and reach speeds more than two times faster than MessagEase in a 2-4 week period. So in summary, the fastest keyboard for Android claim is, again, simply not true when there are other easier and faster virtual keyboards for Android. These are the FACTS!
  
  Reply
  - By Eli Weitz on October 21, 2010 at 9:24 am:
    
    @Antonio,
    
    I used words like ‘homework’ & ‘it seems’ to qualify what I was saying & avoid to seem confrontational, beyond expressing my regard for the app where you didn’t. I was only interested in a fair representation & others also thought you only gave 5 mins to ‘homework’.
    
    Since you mention diff regular qwerty-based keyboards & voice entry so much, you may be more physically oriented to the current standard & perhaps didn’t pay as much attention to how it is much easier to get around the ME keyboard…& to have all types of characters: letters, numbers, symbols, & extended characters in close proximity, (c) copyright symbol for example which I can’t make under Win7 & my computer’s software. Then there is the control of cursor fm the spacebar, much handier than having to move your fingers across the qwerty keyboard to the physical spacebar, in ME it is so much closer.
    
    Also, w/the completely new paradigm, logically speaking, there is the need for allowing for a bit more of homework to get to the point that one can fairly judge how well the app does what it promises & thousands have found that ME does that & on diff OS platforms. You may just be so used to regular qwerty keyboards that the one fm ME is strange to you & that can affect how you take to the new idea. Psychological observation, not trying to put you down.
    
    I believe that since you have done so many reviews, a bit more ‘homework’ might have put you over the ‘hump’ on coming to be able to appreciate ME – I picked it up again after yrs of not having an ME-friendly, upgraded Palm platform & I didn’t take that much time to learn it & I certainly don’t have the reviewing experience you do – I’ve only done beta testing of 10 or so apps, on diff platforms – so I figured that if you did ‘homework’ in a ratio to how diff ME is from other keyboard apps, you too wouldn’t have to spend 5minutes to write a few lines of text.
    
    I agree, that if you had trouble w/the learning curve, it would mean that ME is not faster for you, the question then becomes, how much does it take to learn a whole new system of text entry based on a new paradigm?, take into consideration how I barely passed Jr High School typing, but after getting into computers much later in life, I got a typing-tutor program & I am now a 10 finger touch typist. That took a while.
    
    To finish off on a non-confrontational note, a very interesting historical tidbit:
    the original typewriter manufacturers purposely made the qwerty keyboard layout complex, so that people wouldn’t type too fast & cause the old-fashioned metallic arms to jam when the typist was fast & the metallic arm for one letter didn’t have time to return before the next letter’s metallic arm came up to strike the paper….
    
    p.s. how can I get my droid2 to conform to this forums s/w &/or process needs so I can answer fm my droid? It seems that my droid doesn’t have the right stuff as it is & I find that a bit unusual. It just occured to me that I am using Dolphin browser, & that might have something to do with it; please advise,
    
    Eli
    
    I guess the new paradigm didn’t work for you. So let’s bury any perceived hatchet, OK?
    
    Reply
    - By Antonio Wells on October 21, 2010 at 11:04 am:
      
      Oh, we’re still stating opinion versus fact. I’ll chime back in when FACTS are the topic of discussion.
      
      A few things I can point out is that it seems you choose to point out some of what I state. So allow me to quote myself, “I spent nearly a week with the keyboard in total frustration” in the ‘homework’ evaluation with the app not 5 minutes in total as typed in the screenshot.
      
      I understand the key benefits of the app to easily access numbers and special characters, granted you first learn how to do it and remember the strokes. Got it. My argument to that is, compare the time you save with simply typing partial and/or mispelled beginnings of words on other virtual keyboards then tap the predicted word to complete it; then add a fraction of a second to tap one button for special characters, this is still faster than the time it takes you to tap & swipe every single letter then quickly enter special characters with MessagEase.
      
      Also, proven fact no one types with all numbers and special characters all the time, so the speed benefit of special characters is an ancillary feature benefit. Copyright symbol… honestly, how often does anyone use that is any conversation. Please be realistic. The spacebar opinion is a joke right, the placement is within similar proximity of any other virtual keyboard, where’s Ashton… I’m I being Punk’d?
      
      Also, we’re talking Android. Not Palm or old WinMo (irrelevant and inadequate mobile operating systems) where the choices were between Bad and Worse. Not talking iOS where there are no other choices for native virtual keyboards, this is why MessagEase is a work-around app on that platform in which you use it to copy and paste text into other programs. Again, counter-productive to launch one app to type in a “new paradigm” then go to another app just to send a text, email or tweet. Then there’s Android, where choice is plentiful and innovation has run rampant. “Experience the fastest keyboard for your Android!” I beg to differ.
      
      Regarding your Droid 2 conforming here, we detect your device and deliver the “Mobile-Only” version to you. If on Desktop, you get the full website version. Dolphin Browser (I’m assuming you’re using HD version) has a setting to change the User Agent so you dictate what of the site version you see.
      
      Reply
  - By Cheng Wei on July 27, 2012 at 7:59 am:
    
    Finally got a chance to take a video.
    Here is a video that proves that one can type faster than 60 words per minutes using Messagease.
    
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WX-KRTZQJBc
    
    That’s using two thumbs which I have just mastered.
    Using one thumb I can manage around 50 but will be slightly more tiring.
    
    Reply
By Eli Weitz on October 21, 2010 at 2:29 pm:

@ Antonio,

Jason, in his post above has the right of it. It is a personal preference thing.

I do not appreciate your argumentative, vituperative approach in response to my points i.e. I mention the Palm platform as side player in this picture & you make like it is center stage & proceed to put the Palm platform down. How does that demonstrate the validity of your claims of speaking the facts????

How does that reflect on the bona fides of ME’s claims? It is still an app that is well made & liked, you are just not one of the people who likes it.

You couldn’t write more than just a few lines in five minutes using ME & there are thousands who believe that ME does make text entry easier, & on many platforms. So what does this situation tell you about the facts?

So my question to you is: why can’t you show a little more intellectual honesty- (something a reviewer should certainly practice regularly…) & just say that you could not adapt easily to the learning curve & therefore you cannot recommend it to others? Instead, your argumentative, & vituperative approach reflects poorly on your own intellectual honesty & integrity.

I have unsubscribed fm this msg thread & will not return to view your less than intellectually honest & prejudiced posts. I am also seriously considering joining this forum w/my real name, & my regular email address, so I can report your less-than-professional behavior & prejudiced arguments.

The reality of this situation is as follows: You present your own opinions as fact, & then try to call my remarks into question by characterizing them as mere opinion in the face of your facts! I believe that is called begging the question.

We all agree that there is a bigger learning curve with ME, & that is b/c it is an app w/a completely new paradigm. Can you not appreciate this simple fact- seeing how fond you are of presenting facts?….. Eli

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on October 21, 2010 at 2:49 pm:
  
  @Eli. The entire debate is simple. You, the developer, and any other person who has used the keyboard state one common thing. There is a learning curve which takes time to learn and master. Can you honestly recommend a product that much flawed to the masses???
  
  Second, there have been bold claims that the keyboard is the fastest keyboard on Android… quote from the developer “Experience the fastest keyboard for your Android!” When MessagEase becomes crowned in the Guisness Book of World Records for Fastest virtual keyboard, then I’ll retract my statements.
  
  Everything I’ve stated is based on FACT, not loosely hanging poor opinions, and attacking someone’s creditability and intelligence with a couple words they may have found from the Dictionary.
  
  Reply
By ejaugustine on December 3, 2010 at 4:15 pm:

I could agree with you less on your review. Yes, MessagEase looks weird, takes time to learn (but just remember typing class in school trying to understand the QWERTY keys on the old manual typewriters!), others don’t understand it, but then I don’t give my $300 phone to someone else to play with either! When I upgraded my phone, I got the Droid 2 just for the slideout keyboard. But with my large fingers I had trouble hitting the correct keys. Plus I use strong passwords with special characters. With MessagEase I have all 26 letters and 37 different characters on the main screen with the latest version. So, just as everything else in life, not everything is for everyone, but just because it is not for you means that I should not like it either!

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on December 3, 2010 at 4:26 pm:
  
  Yup… to just hinted one of the many facts why the app didn’t get a swell review rating. It may not be suitable for the majority of users, only a small percentage of general users opt to deal with the quote unquote new paradigm.
  
  Please folks, lets present some promising facts then I can chime in.
  
  Reply
By Sherry Williams on January 15, 2011 at 1:44 pm:

Just to add to your facts:

MessagEase is enjoying a rating of 3.75 over 5 (with over 500 ratings) in the Android Market, with over 40,000 downloads.

Most of those who downloaded and used MessagEase disagree with your assessment.

Reply
By fdis2005 on November 19, 2011 at 1:37 am:

Best case scenario: Your friend borrow your phone to search for something. He can’t figure it out how to type. You take the phone and ask him what he wants to type. You type what he asked with MessagEase’s blank keyboard. Your friend watch you with awe as you type. The words just appears magically on the screen. How do you do that? You smile and show him the result of the search. You friend now thinks you are awesome!

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on November 21, 2011 at 11:59 am:
  
  Awesome redirect. Nicely done
  
  Reply
By Sherryw on November 19, 2011 at 5:28 pm:

Well, Mr. Antonio’s omniscience is being challenge y more than 1200 people who have rated MessagEase at an average rating of 4.1 over 5 (and rising) on the Android Market. With more than 110000 downloads more about 1000 people out of the 1200 rated MessagEase have rated it either a 4, or a full five!

Either tens of thousands of people enjoying MessagEase are smoking something, or Mr. Antonio is wrong!

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on November 21, 2011 at 12:01 pm:
  
  Sherry you have valid points! I believe we have to run your app through the rinse again…
  
  Reply
  - By Sherryw on December 17, 2011 at 12:13 am:
    
    Ok Antonio, but when?
    
    It seems that your review of more than a year ago could not suppress the reaction of more 120,000 people with an average rating of 4.2 (and rising) over 5 now.
    
    I appreciate your candor in admitting that you may have been wrong on this. But how about some alacrity in making this wrong right?
    
    Read the comments of thousands of MessagEase users on and Android Market who rave about it. That would give you at least some clue as to why MessagEase is so popular.
    
    Reply
By Cristian on January 7, 2012 at 12:17 pm:

It seems like you didn’t take the time to test this app in detail. The learning curve is long ok, but this is a more accurate keyboard than swipe, specially in small screens. And another advantage is that this keyboard has lots of symbols in the same square, you dont have to shift anything.

Reply
- By Antonio Wells on January 7, 2012 at 1:04 pm:
  
  Had you read the review you would have seen I did indeed spend some time with the app. Additionally had you read my review of Swype it shared the same learning curve gripe, except this app’s learning curve is far longer than any other virtual keyboard on the market.
  
  Let’s be honest here, realistically, how often do you really need special characters in typical written text on a smartphone since this sadly seems to be the best feature? If you ever used Swype you would know know special characters are one tap away or if you long press for one second, they are right there on the main keyboard.
  
  We should compare this app to another more suitable of its class because comparing it to Swype is like saying Steve Kerr was a greater basketball player than Michael Jordan.
  
  Reply
  - By Sherry Williams on January 7, 2012 at 1:19 pm:
    
    Antonio,
    
    Your rating of TWO stars is in sharp contrast with the average rating of 4.2 stars that almost 1400 people have given it
    
    You: 2 stars?
    1347 people: 4.2 stars
    
    This is a sharp discrepancy!
    
    Could it you who is wrong on this? And not the rest of world?!
    
    Reply
By Tom on April 4, 2012 at 11:01 am:

I’m happy to see so many evangelists for this little app out there. I’ve been using it for months and will never go back. Like others have said, it does depend on the person — this keyboard is killer if you:
* Have giant fingers, like me, and also …
* Hate, hate, hate predictive text. ANY predictive text. It’s not about how good or bad it is, it’s that I’m a speed typist and having a computer change what I’ve typed in any scenario simply makes me profoundly annoyed. MessagEase, once you’ve mastered it, lets you type precisely what you want, very quickly, with extreme accuracy. To me, that’s the whole point of the app — the accuracy and inherent speed mean you don’t NEED word prediction.

And then, of course, the bonus features – above all, the ability to move the cursor word by word, the same as you do with Ctrl+Arrow on a keyboard, or delete a word at a time, like Ctrl+backspace. And the other perks like resizing the keyboard, customizing the color scheme, voice input, and the instant special character thing — the app just gives you the sense that every detail has been extensively thought out, if you’re willing to invest the time on the front end.

Reply
By conradj on April 9, 2012 at 3:11 am:

it took me a few weeks to get halfway comfortable with this ME keypad and i still mess up the “a” and “t” keys much of the time, but i’ve almost completely switched over to it on my android phone.

i think a lot of the reasons listed here in the original review for the speed of other keypads– word prediction, voice input, word entry by key swiping with a visible trail over the keys, those are all strategies for getting around the unsuitability of the qwerty keyboard for use as an on-screen keypad on the tiny screens of current smartphones.

For me the ME keypad just seems to be a more basic solution. i’m typing. not looking at lists of possible words, not speaking and then choosing from a list, not drawing and sometimes redrawing a line o

Reply
By conradj on April 9, 2012 at 3:26 am:

it took me a few weeks to get halfway comfortable with this ME keypad and i still mess up the “a” and “t” keys much of the time, but i’ve almost completely switched over to it on my android phone.

i think a lot of the reasons listed here in the original review for the speed of other keypads– word prediction, voice input, word entry by key swiping with a visible trail over the keys, those are all strategies for getting around the unsuitability of the qwerty keyboard for use as an on-screen keypad on the tiny screens of current smartphones.

For me the ME keypad just seems to be a more basic solution. i’m typing. not looking at lists of possible words, not speaking and then choosing from a list, not drawing and sometimes redrawing a line over tiny keys. It has fewer and bigger keys for one, and also lets me double up the keypad so i have one under each thumb, speeding up entry.

Granted the ergonomics suck and i’m always going to be much faster on a regular keyboard with tactile feedback and individual keys, but the ME keypad does work for me in long text entry. i’m left able to think abt what i want to write.

Reply
By Sherryw on August 17, 2012 at 9:21 am:

MessagEase right now is enjoying:

1. A rating of 4.5 stars out of possible 5 stars on the Android Google Play; This is the average of more than 1850 user votes, a very sharp contrast with Antonio’s verdict here!

And

2. The World Record for fastest texting on a touch screen devices: 76 words per minute!

see this link for details:

http://www.exideas.com/ME/meetOurChamp.php

Reply
By warrl on December 4, 2012 at 10:46 pm:

Your last two points against the MessagEase keyboard are out of date. It has both voice recognition and word prediction. Not too surprising since you reviewed in Oct 2010 and it’s now Dec 2012.

And for some of the people who hate word prediction software that fills in the word it thinks you want, this version doesn’t do that; instead it makes what it thinks are the most likely options available as one further tap each, without in any way disturbing or delaying your ability to just keep typing.

As for the first three points, all are a matter of individual variation and personal taste/style. I had no trouble learning to use MessagEase and even prefer it on my tablet – where tiny keys are NOT a problem.

Granted, I’d rather have a proper full-size QWERTY keyboard – not a touch-sensitive picture of one – but that isn’t exactly practical on a tablet let alone a smartphone.

Reply
By PalmWise on May 14, 2013 at 5:34 am:

I fully agree that the review here is ridiculous – apparently you just couldn’t get your big head around the idea behind this wonderfully efficient keyboard:

It didn’t have text prediction because THAT would have been counterproductive as once you invest a little time you will be able to text so fast that prediction becomes an unnecessary distraction. After all, who uses prediction on their computer keyboard?

The fact that ME now does have prediction is merely due to the developers caving in to pressure from ‘early days’ users against their better judgement.

So the world record holder for non-predictive texting is slow and ‘counter-productive’? Yeah, right.

For my part, I can text at a comfortable 35 WPM with MessagEase without constantly having to look at the screen to make prediction choices that often end up faulty anyway. Plus I can enter any special characters and numbers in milliseconds. If I could afford a phone with more processing power, I’m sure my speed would increase as I currently have to slow myself down to avoid mistakes from the touchscreen not being able to keep all my gestures distinct. (The world record was done on a quad core device.)

To cut a long story short: Please update the review or just remove it.

Reply