Australia an SMS mad nation says new report

Stan Beer
Monday, 22 June 2009 03:46

IT Industry - Market

Australia has long held a reputation of being a nation of sports fanatics but the country is now rapidly adopting the mantle of being a land of crazed SMS text fanatics. According to a new report, far from using SMS for just essential services, Australians will text each other for anything and at practically all life events - and hang the expense!

For a significant proportion of Australians, according to Telstra’s State of the Nation Report, SMS is now used as the preferred form of communication to the phone, email or social networking.

The findings are a revelation given the fact that other studies have shown that SMS is on a bandwidth basis by far the most expensive form of communication available.
 
According to the report, one in three of the 1201 Australians surveyed said they choose SMS to communicate major life events – compared to using the phone, email or social networking sites.
 
The report also found Australians are more likely to SMS news of a birth, (25%), or a promotion, (18%) compared to other major life events.
 
Four in 10 Aussies indicated that they send between 3 and 7 text messages every day to family, friends and their partner respectively.

And few places are sacred from texting – Aussies text, or admit they would text, in many different places, including when they are by themselves to ‘look busy’ (44%), at the movies (34%), in a business meeting (21%) or even at a funeral, christening or wedding (15%).

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