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Mobile text, chat or e-mail?

What is the best way of communication? Is it still face to face?
Written by Eileen Yu, Senior Contributing Editor

What is the best way of communication? Is it still face to face? For many of us today, communication is probably often conducted over e-mail using either a desktop or notebook computer. When we're out and about, we'll switch to our mobile to make a phone call or send a short message service (SMS).

Leaving voice out of the equation, SMS is the clear undisputed leader as the top mobile messaging application.

According to Portio Research, "SMS continues to be a phenomenal success as the cheapest, quickest and easiest to use form of peer-to-peer mobile communication".

The research analyst company said in a recent report that due to declining prices, global SMS revenues are forecast to reach US$67 billion by 2012, driven by 3.7 trillion messages. The number of SMS messages in the Asia-Pacific region will spike sharply from 967.7 billion in 2006 to a staggering 2.1 trillion messages by 2012.

But if you've been following recent headlines, you would have noted the competition that is brewing from mobile e-mail and mobile instant messaging (IM). The proponents of mobile e-mail are rallying for mobile phone users to communicate via e-mail. One industry observer has gone as far as to say "you can't close business deals using SMS". What do you think of these three mobile applications? Drop me an e-mail to share your views.

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