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New Year texts break record
The Daily Telegraph ^ | 5 January, 2005 | David Derbyshire

Posted on 01/05/2005 5:38:29 AM PST by tjwmason

New Year texts break record

By David Derbyshire, Consumer Affairs Editor
(Filed: 05/01/2005)


New Year revellers sent a record 133 million mobile phone text messages on New Year's Day, smashing the previous record by more than 20 million.

Between midnight on Dec 31 and midnight on Jan 1 Britain's five main mobile phone networks dealt with twice the usual volume of messages.

The record day followed a phenomenal year for SMS messaging. According to the Mobile Data Association, an industry body that promotes texting, a record 25 billion texts were sent on mobile phones in Britain last year. That figure is equivalent to 68 million messages a day - more than one a day for every man, woman and child in the country.

Industry experts say the figure is set to rise to around 30 billion this year, despite competition from picture and video messaging.

Mike Short, the chairman of the MDA, said: "The reason text messaging has remained popular is because of convenience and cost effectiveness. The convenience is that it's in your pocket and it couldn't be easier to use.

"In terms of cost effectiveness, there are lots of bundles now available. Text messaging is the most inclusive mobile technology on the planet."

He added: "I don't see any sign of text messaging slowing down. It has many years to go yet for consumer and business use."

Text messaging is a relatively recent phenomenon. Britain's first mobile phone call was made on a Vodafone network on New Year's Day 1985, by the comedian Ernie Wise, but the first text, or SMS, message was not made until the late 1980s.

Texting was invented to allow engineers building Britain's mobile phone network to communicate and was made available to the public by Vodafone in 1992.


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Foreign Affairs; United Kingdom
KEYWORDS: mobilephone; sms; text

1 posted on 01/05/2005 5:38:30 AM PST by tjwmason
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To: tjwmason

I don't understand the whole text messaging thing. Why waste time typing in a message when you can call and say the same thing in half the time?


2 posted on 01/05/2005 5:52:54 AM PST by SilentServiceCPOWife (A tagline! A tagline! My kingdom for a tagline!)
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To: SilentServiceCPOWife
Just found out that my cell plan allows 100 free text messages per month.

But I've never used the feature (that tiny keyboard is a PAIN) and don't think I ever will.

3 posted on 01/05/2005 6:16:26 AM PST by martin_fierro (</pith >)
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To: martin_fierro

Last night my husband was reading cell phone reviews on Amazon and he read one in which the guy said that he liked the particular phone except for the fact that he wished the font was larger so he could read his text messages more easily while he was driving.


4 posted on 01/05/2005 6:30:29 AM PST by SilentServiceCPOWife (A tagline! A tagline! My kingdom for a tagline!)
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