U.S. texters send 4 billion SMS messages ... a day

Yahoo Tech ^ | 10/09/2009 | Yahoo Tech

[ErnstStavroBlofeld]

Twice a year, the organization representing the wireless industry puts out a bunch of facts and figures on how much we're using our phones in the U.S., and each time, I can't help but marvel at the results.

The big number this time around, according to the CTIA: In the past six months alone, Americans sent an estimated 740 billion text messages, which comes out to about 4.1 billion messages each day.

Put another way: That's 11.7 text messages a day for every man, woman, and child in the country. (Of course, the average American teen can fire off 11 text messages in the time it takes you to read this paragraph.)

Or, how about this: An SMS has a maximum capacity of 160 characters, so let's say (for the sake of example) that your average text message is about 80 characters long. And let's assume that your average novel contains about 100,000 words, and each word has about five letters.

So ... assuming all that (and keeping in mind that my math is a little shaky), we here in the States are writing the equivalent of about 656,000 books—all via SMS—every 24 hours. At that rate, we could match the entire catalog of the entire New York Public Library system (which holds about 20.4 million books) in a little over a month. Amazing ... although whether you'd really want to read all those SMS books is another question.

[Roses0508]

We are keeping my 3-year-old grandson. His mother called and in a moment of oppositional behavior, he said he did not want to talk to her. She hung up. Then, naturally, he wanted to talk to her. When I called back, the line was busy. Little guy’s response “I’ll just text her”. My husband and I collapsed laughing.

[justlurking]

we got to figure out how to do this in the usa. a very common practice here is for cash register receipts to bug you to log in to their web site and tell you what you think of the store, and you might win a prize!

I've seen a few places that are now offering something if you send a text to a certain number. For instance, I saw a banner in Arby's that offered a coupon for your next visit if you sent a text to a certain number -- presumably in the form of a reply message you could show to the cashier.

But, I'll pass. These offers are designed to get your phone number so that they can send you "related" messages at a later date.