For such a little island the UK certainly sends a lot of text messages – around 83 billion in 2008 alone, according to the latest Ofcom International Communications Market data report. In the text messaging leaderboard we’re second only to the USA, a country that has a population five times bigger than ours but sent ten times more messages – a whopping 830 billion in 2008.
It’s pretty cool that such a basic phone function is still going strong despite the flashier options available now, like email or mobile instant messaging. There’s nothing quite like that satisfying sound of a text message being delivered, or reading back a particularly flirty text conversation while smiling a secret smile. Nor the shameful realisation that in your drink-addled state you sent messages to everyone you ever met letting them know that even though you haven’t spoken for three years, you lvoe them alot!1a!
It’ll be interesting to see whether or not the UK’s text messaging rates decline when the data for 2009 is in. With the rise of the smartphone over the past year, and access to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter available on more and more handsets, will we have been as text-happy over the past twelve months?
Good news for UK consumers too, we’re getting some of the best deals on mobile phones in the world, and the lowest mobile prices in the UK even fell by around 8 per cent between July 2008 and July 2009. Score!
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