Text messages (Cell phone systems) (Topical Term)

Work cat.: Wan2tlk? : ltle bk of txt msgs, 2000: prelims. (text messages) p. 4 of cover (text-messaging dictionary for every mobile phone ... abbreviations, emoticons and their meanings) p. 7 (text messaging has its own grammar and 'netiquette' derived from e-mail and internet chat rooms)

Communication from Michael Proffitt, New Words Group, OED, July 2, 2001 (draft entry for text message, due for publication on the OED Online site before the end of the year. So far, we have traced the use of the term back to a 1978 periodical: 1978 S.A. Kent in Small Systems Software Vol. 3 page 2. This early use is slightly different from that familiar now, and seems to refer broadly to any written message transmitted electronically.)

Concise Ox. Eng. dict., 2001 (Text message, an electronic communication sent and received by mobile phone) p. 1681 Appendix 7, SMS: electronic text messaging (SMS stands for Short Message (or Messaging) Service and is the name given to the system that enables mobile phone users to send and receive text messages. On most mobile phone networks each text message is restricted to about 150 characters, so abbreviations are used.)

Oxford dictionaries online, Feb. 13, 2012: text (noun 4: a text message) text message (an electronic communication sent and received by mobile phone; derivatives: text messaging, noun)