Royal couple exchange vows while viewers exchange texts

As Prince William and Catherine Middleton exchanged vows last week, hoards of mobile users on both sides of the Atlantic exchanged text messages.

by Helen Leggatt

According to mobile services company Sybase, the combined daily SMS/MMS traffic of the UK and US spiked at the start of the Royal wedding, rising a whopping 600%.

Despite the early start, Americans were keen not to miss out on any of the action. US carriers registered a 31% increase in SMS/MMS traffic right at the start of the event.

It's not surprising that Sybase's data shows the four hour window for the wedding was the most active SMS/MMS period so far this year - even beating the 24hr period for New Year 2011.

Sybase's data shows the UK and Australia to be "the top two destinations for MMS related traffic" while traffic originating from Ireland showed 20 - 30% rise.

The latest news regarding the death of Osama bin Laden also resulted in a frenzy of messaging, says Sybase, with a rise of 18% in less than half an hour, reports iTWire.com.

Tags: MMS, mobile marketing, Osama Bin Laden, Royal wedding, SMS, text message