Was SMS invented in 1861?

[Bob Russell]

Short text messages from a mobile device are all the rage these days. But the folks from 160 Characters are saying that it's really just an extension of a much earlier idea from the 1800s - the postcard!

Not convinced? Listen to this description of the arrival of the postcard...

"Once upon a time, major service providers around the world introduced a short message service allowing people to send multiple messages to each other for a nominal fixed fee. Typically the message space was small, and as a result people invented methods to deal with this by cramming in as much information as possible using shorthand, acronyms and restricted grammar. It became very popular, creating upgrades to services infrastructure, and employing additional people, all despite the fact that people were already using the same service provider to communicate with each other using similar services. Sounds familiar?"

But while there are some very interestesting similarities, it sounds a little like saying the computer was really invented in 1868 by Christopher Latham Sholes when he patented the first modern typewriter.

Via TechDirt.