Nearly 20 years after influencing the way a large number of people
around the world interact in daily life, the SMS, or short messaging
service, appears to be on the decline.
Used by four billion people
around the world, this revolutionary form of communication took the
world by storm after its birth in December 1992. But after two decades
of feverishly pushing tiny keypads with our thumbs, the volume of texts
sent as SMS has undergone decline, media watchdog Ofcom reports.
The
number of text messages sent in Britain peaked at 39.7 billion at the
end of last year, but it is now down to 38.5 billion, following two
quarterly declines. This fall has been attributed to new forms of
communication which have taken over from the basic SMS system, Daily
Mail reported.
Owners of modern smartphones today have a plethora
of ways to communicate with each other including Tweeting and instant
messaging.
The first ever text sent by engineer Neil Papworth from
his personal computer to Vodafone's Richard Jarvis in December 1992
read: "Merry Christmas".