A long time ago (1985) in a faraway land (Germany) lived a man named Friedhelm Hillebrand. And he had a question: Just how many characters does the average person need to communicate?

Care to guess what the answer was?

Fast foward nearly a quarter-century and you can still see the fruits of Hillebrand's labor. Text messaging is as popular as ever (and often used more on phones than voice calls).

Anyhoo, the L.A. Times has a neat piece on Hillebrand and the birth of text messaging, as well as what the old guy's got up his sleeve next. Check it out.

Why Text Messages are Limited to 160 Characters

With the advent of a certain feature phone from Apple Computers, mobile software developers have been forced to raise the bar in relation to the UI (User Interface) of their applications. Of the myriad of arguments for and against the iPhone’s various features, the interface is undeniably an exercise in intuitive and effective artistry and is a step in the right direction for mobile devices.

ViTO Technology, the makers of Winterface, has carved their niche in the Windows Mobile world by developing software that is feature rich, but also has an element of eye candy to it. SMS-Chat is a threaded text messaging application that adds some iPhone like functionality to your Windows Mobile Pro device.

For those stuck without a 6.1 update or those who really dislike 6.1's default threaded SMS in Outlook, Vito's SMS-Chat might be worth a look.

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With March Madness fully underway, many of us are looking for ways to stay up-to-date with what is happening in the world of college basketball. Here is a look at some of the ways you can use your Windows Mobile phone towards that end.

• Web browser - Many of the major names in sports news (ESPN, Fox Sports, CBS Sportsline, etc.) have made improvements to their mobile websites. My suggestion is try them all, see which one you like the most.
• Text messages/Email - Most of the sites mentioned above offer some sort of alert service. The advantage of this obviously is that if you don’t have a data plan, but you have a couple thousand unused text messages every month, you can get scores and news sent to your phone. Also, this eliminates the need for navigation in PIE. My personal favorite provider is CBS Sportsline. Their website allows you to pick your favorite teams, what updates you want, and even what time of day you want to turn the updates on or off.
• Mobile TV - Obviously the ultimate would be getting live video. There are several options out there…
  • Slingbox - A Slingbox along with their SlingPlayer Mobile client would allow you to stream your TV signal from your home to your mobile device.
  • HandiTV - Allows you to watch streaming content from various providers (without subscription fees).
  • MobiTV - Similar to HandiTV, but with a $9.99 per month subscription fee. Channels include ESPN Mobile TV and Fox Sports.

How do you stay in touch with the sports world from your phone?

Update: You can grab a special March Madness Channel on Zumobi, too!