Other technologies can carry more complex, detailed messages; other delivery systems are easier to use, less limited in scope and arguably far more secure; and few means of communication rely on such an unwieldy and inefficient data input process. Yet mobile phone text message is a medium that has had enormous impact on society over the past few years.
Telephone-based short-messaging service (SMS), to give it its full name, has grown up, donned a suit and marched straight into the board room of many commercial organisations. Anyone who thinks it is useful only for spotty, awkward teenagers with a lamentable grasp of grammar and punctuation is living in an ivory tower.
