Love is a text message?

First it was Christmas, then New Year's Eve. Now Valentine's Day is predicted to be the next hot date for text messaging.

Warrick Ponder, a spokesperson for Telstra, told iTnews that the telco's predictions of more than eight million SMS love messages was based on large growth over the Christmas and New Year period.

“Generally SMS growth has been particularly substantial over the last couple of years,” he said.

According to Ponder, it was anticipating that MMS (multimedia messaging service) would also be popular. Christmas saw 50,000 MMS and on New Year's Eve and Day there were 60,000 recorded, he said.

Ponder said that Christmas, the New Year and Valentine's Day were the three biggest SMS days of the year.

Last year Telstra recorded 5.7 million SMS messages sent on Valentine's Day, according to a statement issued by the telco. It also found that about 1,500 icons and ringtones were downloaded by Telstra customers last year, and the company anticipates that number to double on Valentine's Day this year.