I recall having MSN on a symbian smartphone just before iPhones even existed. Really cool and all, but I could only communicate to a handful of people with it.

I recall having MSN on a symbian smartphone just before iPhones even existed. Really cool and all, but I could only communicate to a handful of people with it. SMS was the de-facto only way, always 1-1 and charged per message. Internet 2g/3g was being pushed for low prices (10 EUR/month for unlimited use) but there wasn't really a mass market yet. I could tether my laptop to my phone abut that was really something exceptional, but most people were like "who needs internet on a phone?" Had too look it up, this was just 14 years ago. Then about 6? years ago almost overnight everyone (including mom) had a smartphone with Whatsapp and SMS/MMS was a thing of the past.