Although most big companies have followed the fancy lure of WAP and client apps into slow launch delirium, it is still texting that has caught on like wildfire with consumers. It is easy to learn, easy to consume and so much quicker than waiting for the mobile web. WAP still stands for Wait And Pay, but texting has spawned a number of interesting services available in 160 character chunks.

Today the Wall Street Journal did a write up on the roses and thorns of a few useful text-based services, including Teleflip for mobile email.

If you’d like to liven up your phone, you’ll probably want to store a few of the information retrieval short codes in your address book as well. You never know when you’ll be looking for a curry place near a movie theater showing the latest blockbuster while avoiding handicapped parking.

Read No Blackberry? Your Cellphone May Do the Trick. from the Wall Street Journal.