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You might have forgotten to celebrate a big occasion! The UN recently observed “International Statistics Day.” Yes, before you know it Hallmark will come out with a “Happy Statistics Day” greeting card. I must say, it seems we already have enough statistics to keep us busy- I don’t know if we need a special day to celebrate the “too much information” age! In looking at the information I did, however, see a startling statistic that makes me worry about the future of human communication. The UN studied the current state to telecommunications and found that 1.6 trillion text messages shoot around this world every year. Let me break down the math for you: that number means that every second of every day there are 200,000 text messages being sent. Texting now has its own special language of letters and abbreviations that makes the punch-those-little-letters messages go even faster.

While it is amazing that we can communicate at the speed of light, I worry that maybe we get a little too used to shortcuts and the ambiguities of those short little messages. OMG, will we forget how to talk to each other! (For those of you not up on your texting language, OMG means Oh My God!) The technology we have today makes it possible to communicate in ways never dreamed of before. Remember when the goal was “reach out and touch someone?” Now we can reach out and touch the whole world in a nano-second! The only problem is that it makes me wonder how good we are at communicating anything of value.

People now joke about “snail mail” – we remember how it was waiting a week to get a letter or document you needed. E-mail was a revolution for business and personal use; no more waiting, no more missed deliveries! Texting is a revolution too but I wonder if it’s a revolution for the better – there is something I miss about actually hearing a person’s voice! A text message, while it may be fast, is a rather “flat” medium. Was that text supposed to be funny? Sarcastic? Angry? Hmmm…. Can’t really tell!

Yes, instant communication is great but sometimes I really need to hear a person’s voice to understand what he is saying. Just by listening you can tell if you are hearing a frown or a smile! 200,000 invisible messages flying through the air every second, just makes me wonder how many of them are really saying anything at all!