Publisher Mike Grenville at 160 Characters has posted a round up of some of the numbers of text messages sent on New Year’s Eve that have been announced so far by various world wide operators.
UK – O2 announced a record 166 million messages were sent over its network in a 24-hour period ending at 7.30 am on New Year’s Day 2009, an average of 1,900 messages sent every second. Switzerland – Swiss mobile users sent 106 million SMS and MMS messages on 31 December 2008 and 1st January of this year, up from 100 milliion last year. This works out at 14 messages for every man, woman and child in the country. Belgium – across operators Base, Proximus and Mobistar, 78.3 million SMS were sent between the 8pm 31st December and 8am on 1st January 2009. France – there were 360 million SMS sent in France. Bulgaria – over 14 million text messages were sent on New Year’s Eve by the subscribers of Bulgaria’s two largest mobile phones operators. Thailand – the Bangkok Post reported that on New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day about 89 million SMS were sent. And not covered by Mike, but reported by the Irish Independent, 30 million texts were sent in Ireland. A busy day all round then!