End of an era: Facebook catches up with land lines as way to stay in touch

Facebook is now as popular a way to communicate with friends and family in the UK as the fixed-line telephone.

The traditional hallway handset has fallen to fifth place in a list of how Brits 'talk' to each other and is now one of 7.4 different channels of communication used by the average UK home.

According to the research for software company Kana, this rises to 8.4 among 18-24 year olds with email the favourite across the nation, used by 90% of those questioned.

Mobile phones are second (83%) and despite the surge in instant messaging applications, text messaging remains popular with three quarters of people.





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Even pensioners are adopting different communication methods with an average of six per person. One in nine of those over 65 now use email and more than half are on Facebook. However, 83% still used a fixed-line telephone in the last six months compared to a national average of 69%.

James Norwood, of Kana, said: "The idea that nine-year-old Facebook is already as pervasive a tool as Alexander Graham Bell's 130-year-old invention is extraordinary and says everything about the rapidly-changing shape of consumer interactions.

"People are now much more comfortable with public digital communication and with the security of web-based communication."

He added: "The reality is that many homes today are better at fielding and handling multichannel communication than some call centres.

"We're seeing a new generation of hyper-connected consumers, adept at sharing and assimilating input from several sources - and hyperconnection applies across all age groups."

But it is communication via social media, web-based platforms and instant messaging that continues to grow. Twitter was used by a quarter of those questioned in the past half year.

And as more messaging applications are launched, the days of texting too could be numbered.

Last year SMS volumes showed their first sign of decline and with a host of new services attracting users and funding in the US, this looks set to continue, especially with the impending launch of the massively popular BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) on the iOS and Android platforms.

Previously it's only been available to owners of BlackBerry devices and was a huge success with teenage BB owners. However, it has courted controversy being cited as one of the methods used by the London rioters of 2011 to communicate.

A tweet from T-Mobile this week apparently set the date for its launch as June 27 but this has not yet been confirmed by BlackBerry.

However, BBM itself is overshadowed by the likes of WhatsApp, which reportedly boasts three times as many users at around 200 million.

New rivals are also hot on the heels of both such as Snapchat - increasingly used by teens and young adults to send pictures - Viber and MessageMe, which just passed five million users in its first 75 days.

Other popular services include Numbuzz and WeChat with registered user numbers of 100 million plus.

Changes in communication are also being caused by the growth of 4G, which brings fast internet speeds without the need for a traditional fixed broadband connection.
 
EE, which was quick to launch its 4G services last year before its rivals will later this summer, yesterday (Thurs) announced more than half a million users in Britain in seven months.

It represents the fastest 4G take up in Europe with more UK cities set to be covered and Pay-As-You-Go 4GEE mobile broadband plans also being rolled out.

Ten major cities - Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester and Sheffield - are to receive a doubling of speeds to a headline figure of 80Mbps - a move designed to help those wanting to download or stream HD video, share large files or tether multiple devices.

Recent independent testing put EE's average 4G download speed at 19.4Mbps, faster than many home broadband services, although it is far pricier.

But it is this change that could eventually spell the death-knell for the fixed telephone, with many homes now only taking a traditional line to get themselves broadband.

Kester Mann, of industry analysts CCS Insight, believes this will still take a while however.

He said: "Although mobile has been a substitute for the fixed-line phone for some time, the challenges of in-door coverage means it is not a direct substitute for fixed-line broadband services."