Are Americans Text Happy?

So I got back to the Homotron Dungeon at Gay Gamer Castle last night and got settled in to put some quality time into Warhammer Online, but I figured I should check my RSS feeds first to catch up on the buzz for the day when I stumbled upon this fantastically sensationalized headline: "Americans text more than they talk." It's wonderful. It's beautiful. It's a complete misrepresentation of the information presented in the article.

The proof? Second paragraph:

"For the second quarter of 2008, U.S. mobile subscribers sent and received on average 357 text messages per month, compared with making and receiving 204 phone calls a month, according to Nielsen. The new statistic is a clear indication that Americans have jumped onto the SMS text bandwagon."

So, since I sent and received 357 messages last month and only made or received 204 phones calls a month, then we must be drifting apart from each other and the fine art of conversation must be dieing, right? Nevermind the amount of conversation conducted in those 204 calls most likely far exceeds the information conveyed in the text messages. That's unimportant. We are obviously headed in the direction of self-imposed isolation that will only lead to nuclear fall-out. Clearly.

Pathetic, assanine conclusions aside, I think it's an interesting statistic. Personally, I believe that it's really only indicative of the changing nature of communication, not the eventual destruction of that communication. What else it means is the rising cost of texting these days. But it doesn't matter really, we're all headed toward becoming utter hermits anyway.