Not really but there’s a noticeable drop in my sms and calls yesterday. Two or three years ago, yuletide greetings via text messages pour in as early as hours before christmas time. I remember having to load up hundreds and preparing my “contact list” in my phonebook for groups sms later before christmas. Then my phone’s sms notification starts to go berserk as early as six o’clock in the evening before christmas eve. This rabid text messaging and mobile phone calls get so ugly that we complain about Telco’s “greed” and inability to handle such huge demand for their service.  Was “all circuits are busy now, please try your call later” sound familiar? Lines and bandwidth clog up just before christmas so complain of telco’s delayed messages and busy lines. Complains that even pushed some politician to launch a congressional inquiry on it!

Social media killed sms on christmas?

This year though, cellphone calls and sms seem to have “mellowed” a bit. The social media savvy cellphone users trooped to facebook, twitter, skype, yahoo messenger and other social media engines to send their yuletide greetings. Me for example, I can only count with my fingers the number of people who texted me and the persons I sent christmas messages yesterday. It’s not even one fourth of the sms greetings I sent last year!

So what made that sms/call usage drop? The obvious answer would be related to social media. Social media is always connected and its free.No amount of text messaging, especially if its delayed, could beat that advantage. The only disadvantage? Well, you (or the recipient) have to be connected to the net. Otherwise, its useless. Philippines is tops as social media user globally and with the kind of internet penetrability we have, its a matter of time really. But wait, mobile telcos are already grabbing the mobile social media market! I guess that’s taking cue on the current trends now.

So did social media kill sms on christmas? Not yet, but its heading that way somehow.