Concept
Text messaging
Related concepts (30)
Chat room
The term chat room, or chatroom (and sometimes group chat; abbreviated as GC), is primarily used to describe any form of synchronous conferencing, occasionally even asynchronous conferencing. The term can thus mean any technology, ranging from real-time online chat and online interaction with strangers (e.g., online forums) to fully immersive graphical social environments. The primary use of a chat room is to share information via text with a group of other users.
At sign
The at sign, , is an accounting and invoice abbreviation meaning "at a rate of" (e.g. 7 widgets @ £2 per widget = £14), now seen more widely in email addresses and social media platform handles. It is normally read aloud as "at" and is also commonly called the at symbol, commercial at, or address sign. The absence of a single English word for the symbol has prompted some writers to use the French arobase or Spanish and Portuguese arroba, or to coin new words such as ampersat and asperand, or the (visual) onomatopoeia strudel, but none of these have achieved wide use.
E.161
E.161 is an ITU-T Recommendation that defines the arrangement of digits, letters, and symbols on telephone keypads and rotary dials. It also defines the recommended mapping between the basic Latin alphabet and digits (e.g., "DEF" on 3). Uses for this mapping include: Multi-tap and predictive text systems. Forming phonewords from telephone numbers. Using alphabetic characters (e.g. as a mnemonic) in a personal identification number. Keypads are specified both in the common 4 × 3 and several variations, such as 6 × 2 and 2 × 5.
Predictive text
Predictive text is an input technology used where one key or button represents many letters, such as on the physical numeric keypads of mobile phones and in accessibility technologies. Each key press results in a prediction rather than repeatedly sequencing through the same group of "letters" it represents, in the same, invariable order. Predictive text could allow for an entire word to be input by single keypress. Predictive text makes efficient use of fewer device keys to input writing into a text message, an e-mail, an address book, a calendar, and the like.
Feature phone
A feature phone (also spelled featurephone) is a type or class of mobile phone that retains the form factor of earlier generations of mobile telephones, typically with press-button based inputs and a small non-touch display. They tend to use an embedded operating system with a small and simple graphical user interface, unlike large and complex mobile operating systems such as Android from Google or iOS from Apple. Their functions are limited compared to smartphones, which integrate the phone with an internet communications device.
Telex
Telex is a telecommunication service that provides text-based message exchange over the circuits of the public switched telephone network or by private lines. The technology operates on switched station-to-station basis with teleprinter devices at the receiving and sending locations. Telex was a major method of sending written messages electronically between businesses in the post–World War II period. Its usage went into decline as the fax machine grew in popularity in the 1980s.
WeChat
WeChat and Weixin () are a Chinese instant messaging, social media, and mobile payment app developed by Tencent. First released in 2011, it became the world's largest standalone mobile app in 2018 with over 1 billion monthly active users. WeChat has been described as China's "app for everything" and a super-app because of its wide range of functions. WeChat provides text messaging, hold-to-talk voice messaging, broadcast (one-to-many) messaging, video conferencing, video games, mobile payment, sharing of photographs and videos and location sharing.
Direct marketing
Direct marketing is a form of communicating an offer, where organizations communicate directly to a pre-selected customer and supply a method for a direct response. Among practitioners, it is also known as direct response marketing. By contrast, advertising is of a mass-message nature. Response channels include toll-free telephone numbers, reply cards, reply forms to be sent in an envelope, websites and email addresses.
Computer-mediated communication
Computer-mediated communication (CMC) is defined as any human communication that occurs through the use of two or more electronic devices. While the term has traditionally referred to those communications that occur via computer-mediated formats (e.g., instant messaging, email, chat rooms, online forums, social network services), it has also been applied to other forms of text-based interaction such as text messaging. Research on CMC focuses largely on the social effects of different computer-supported communication technologies.
Japanese mobile phone culture
In Japan, mobile phones became ubiquitous years before the phenomenon spread worldwide. In Japanese, mobile phones are called keitai denwa, literally "portable telephones," and are often known simply as keitai (携帯). A majority of the Japanese population own cellular phones, most of which are equipped with enhancements such as video and camera capabilities. As of 2018, 65% of the population owned such devices.