That's just a tidbit thrown around to soothe those irked by the limit. It's been well over a decade since the last mobile phone was sold that couldn't handle long/concatenated SMS. The reality is that the 140 character limit is just an arbitrary one; one that makes Twitter, Twitter.
Anecdote is not the singular of data, but I have been able to send/receive long messages using Android and iPhone on AT&T.
Just yesterday I even noticed Android's core SMS app is even nice enough to tell you when the message is overflowing into a second SMS, so you know that you and the recipient will get billed for more than one SMS. Which brings me to another idea:
Perhaps the billing issue is more of a concern as well -- receiving concatenated messages certainly would cost more for (American) users not on unlimited SMS plans, and presumably would cost more for Twitter to send out through their gateway?
It's not a defense. It's a fact. My co-worker prefers to receive all tweets via SMS. They advertise the SMS feature at the top of every page. Calling people names at every turn isn't going to make your point more valid.
