More on the US elections and text messaging. I picked up the juicy fact that Obama has his own US shortcode, thanks to this piece in the Straits Times.
Link: Straits Times
Ms Julie Ask, an analyst at Jupiter Research, said that Mr Obama appeared to have an early edge in using mobile technology, with a snappier code - 62262 spells Obama, for example - and with mobile content and ‘wallpaper†for phones.
She said that candidates should not assume that only young voters would be moved by text.
‘I would remind (candidates) that the percentage of cellphone users aged 55 and over using text messaging doubled last year,†she said.
I’m frankly surprised that no other candidate has their own shortcode. This can’t be true! I’ll need to have a look and see. Perhaps the author of this meant that Obama is the only candidate to have a shortcode spelling his name? I wonder what HILARY would be dialed out on the keypad. 445279… too many digits for a shortcode. They’d need to do something like HILRY… don’t think US networks will allow shortcodes starting with 4 though. So I’d recommend they just got a memorable series of numbers.
Related Posts
On this day- MAXroam Wants To Reward Your High Roaming Bill - 2007
- Bluetooth Car Stereo Offers More Than You Think - 2007
- Alltel Hooks Up With Spinvox for Voice2TXT - 2007
- Starship Troopers Voted Best Mobile Action Game in Germany - 2007
- AQA knocking back 250 questions a minute - 2007
- Christmas email survey results - 2007
- T-Mobile USA switched off Twitter; back on now? - 2007
- Australian Archbishop creates text-formatted prayer - 2007
- Every Etisalat customer gets voice SMS - 2007
- Techie help needed re Java mobile certificates - 2007
Bensmith on 
Comment by Chris Newell on 17 December 2007:
Just thought we would set the record straight for you… Hillary has her own shortcode, 442008, meaning the 44th president of the US! The code has been active for a while, you can text JOIN to 442008 from any US cell phone to join her campaign! You can also sign up from http://www.HillaryClinton.com.
Chris
http://www.InterlinkedMedia.com
Comment by Ewan on 17 December 2007:
Ah wicked Chris, thanks for that! 442008… six digits… here was me thinking the US networks only did five…
Comment by James Whatley on 17 December 2007:
Correct me if I’m wrong but don’t people in the US have an aversion to 5 or 6 number short codes?
I can’t quite remember - it was an old conversation around user behaviour and associations back in my Refresh Mobile days… but I think the 6 digit short code implies something.
Can’t remember what - I may be just talking rubbish mind.
Comment by Chris Newell on 17 December 2007:
Early on the carriers only used 4 digit codes, which they shared with a few big brands. But once interoperability started, 5 and 6 digit shortcodes became available on most carriers. It seems 5 digits are more popular, but there are some uses for 6 digit ones (like 442008). Also, we see a lot of alpha codes, but now more and more we’re seeing just numeric codes being used -mainly due to blackberries & windows mobile phones not having the letters mapped to numbers easily… also price seems to be a factor with $1000/mth for a pick your own number or $500 for a random number.
Pingback by Mobile Messaging 2.0 » Get The Electronic Vote Out with Mobile Messagin: a hosted discussion on mobile messaging, devices, and user practices and trends on 28 December 2007:
[...] MacLeod pointed this out over the festive seasons with a post on Obama’s use of SMS shortcodes (in his case OBAMA, or 62262). It didn’t take long [...]