On the old blog, Sarah posted something about this Economist article about T9. That post is mysteriously gone, but I’m re-running my follow-up, because I love quoting myself:

Perhaps underscoring the difficulties associated with using (or learning, more to the point) T9, the article cited in the previous entry makes this statement: “Abbreviations such as ‘can’t’ and ‘won’t’ are difficult to type.” Leaving aside, of course, that the writer meant “contractions,” s/he must have been using a different T9 layout from the one I have, since “can’t” and “won’t” are no harder to type than any other five letter combination, and each is the first guess for its sequence.
There’s also no mention of the fact that T9 was not designed for cellphones, as such, and works better when freed from the phone keypad mapping.