* Two very different yet innovative uses of Short Message Service
This week and next, we’re going to steal a little thunder from our colleagues who write the Network World newsletters on wireless and discuss a few topics that include a convergence angle. Today, we’ll highlight two applications that demonstrate the versatility of Short Message Service, or SMS. (For those unfamiliar with SMS, just ask any teenager who keeps sending and receiving text messages on their mobile phone.)
Recently, Cingular and The WB Television Network announced they were giving fans of The WB’s “One Tree Hill” series a say in how a story line should end – via text message voting on their Cingular Wireless phones.
According to their statement, participating fans sent an SMS text message (the word “uDecide”) to a specific phone number. In reply, the participants were sent a return message the night of the show.
In the “uDecide” ballot, fans selected either “A” or “B” over the course of three days. The final outcome decided the show’s story line for the following week. Like the traditional 800-number call in voting schemes, participants could vote as often as they liked, but a message charge applied for each message. No hanging chads in this vote, although we’re not sure this method is ready to support national presidential elections.
SMS uses the signaling channel to send and receive data, much like many point-of-sale terminals that use an X.25 call setup packet to validate bank account charges.
In another application, SMS messages are being used by rotating billboards commonly seen in Europe to shorten or extend exposure of a particular advertiser’s message based on the fees paid to the billboard company. The SMS format is sent to a module that links to mechanical device inside the billboard to update exposure instructions – eliminating the need to dispatch a technician for a manual reset.
While both of these examples are niche applications, it just goes to show how a little imagination can be applied to re-use communications technology for an altogether different purpose.
