We've become all thumbs

More and more thumbs are doing the talking as South Africans turn to texting rather than making cellphone calls.

But while cheaper internet access is changing the way we communicate, the high cost of data is prohibiting the poor from hopping on the cyber highway.

The younger you are, the more likely you are to use your thumbs to keep in contact, said tech expert Arthur Goldstuck.

It is a trend that is happening in the rest of the world, but South Africa is a little different.

Overseas cellphone companies are noticing a decrease in the volume of cellphone calls. The number of calls made in the UK has been dropping since 2008, according to media regulator Ofcom.

In South Africa, however, more people are making cellphone calls. The reason is costs are dropping.

"The average effective price of a prepaid call on our network is down almost 25% year-on-year.

"The volume of calls, meanwhile, has increased almost the same amount, so the net effect is a small decline in overall revenue. In other words, people are calling more and paying less," said Vodacom spokes-man Richard Boorman.

MTN said they had not experienced a decline in calls either, although they had noticed their younger users were more inclined to use messaging to communicate.

But what is changing, explained Goldstuck, is the revenue mix, where the proportion spent on calls is dropping while spend on data grows. Already online messaging programmes such as Whatsapp, Facebook and MiXit have a strong presence in South Africa.

There are 11 million Whatsapp users in South Africa, and in the next 12 months that is likely to increase to nearly two thirds of the population, according to research done by Goldstuck's company, WorldWide Worx.

But what would be the game- changer, according to Goldstuck, would be cheaper data rates.

"The profit margins of cellphone companies will then come under extreme pressure," he said.

Overseas, declining call volumes have resulted in companies offering cheap flat call rates.