On Wednesday, CTIA – The Wireless Association released its Semi-Annual Wireless Industry Survey results for 2008.
According to the Survey, Americans sent over 1 Trillion text messages in 2008, almost triple the number (363 million) from 2007. That works out to roughly 3.5 billion txts per day, or almost 13 messages per wireless user (the survey reports that there are “more than 270 million wireless users” in the US) per day.
When you factor in the increasing popularity of smartphones (iPhone 3G, T-Mo G1, BlackBerry Storm, yadda, yadda), Twitter’s pop culture explosion, and the extra 15 million new wireless subscribers in ’08, among other factors, all of a sudden 13/per doesn’t really seem all that staggering.
Even so, we’ve officially entered the Age of Trillions (stimulus package, anyone?). Gone are the days when Billions (yes, with a capital B) seemed unfathomable. But alas, I digress. Here are a few more fun facts:
[W]ireless revenues showed impressive year-to year gains, as wireless data service revenues for the year 2008 rose to more than $32 billion. This represents a 39% increase over 2007, when data revenues totaled $23.2 billion. Wireless data revenues for 2008 amounted to nearly 22% of all wireless service revenues, and represent what consumers spend on non-voice services.
Other highlights of the survey include: wireless customers using more than 2.2 trillion minutes in 2008, an increase of 100 billion minutes from 2007, and record-breaking six-month wireless service revenues of more than $75 billion with annual service revenues reaching $148 billion by year-end 2008.