Smart Mobs: Texting & Mobilization
Thinking back on all the books we read in our SAGES course, I realized how irrelevant Smart Mobs was to our class. Not in the theory of ubiquitous computing nor in the idea of how technology will transform our futures. The book is irrelevant because such a mindset is unlikely to occur in the near future of our country.
In the case of the Philippines where individuals got together to impeach a political leader, there was an overwhelming sense of political interest and urgency. Yet in a country as politically apathetic as ours, is such a physical mobilization possible??
For the first time in awhile we saw the country split during the most recent presidential elections between Bush and Kerry. Even the mass media was in on the political war with the “Vote or Die” mantra used by the MTV crowds and with the public aware that every votes does indeed count after witnessing what happened in Florida the four years prior. Yet even with all the celebrity endorsement the voter turnout was still barely over 50% (55.3). It would be interesting to imagine something like the Orange Revolution here in America.
As I began thinking about other mobile revolutions I realized ubiquitous technology is undeniably dependent upon the culture of a country. It depends upon the links between the younger generations and a common source of interest. The only two things I could imagine which could possibly work to physically mobilize the youth of America were celebrities, religion, and free giveaways.
If the G8 concert had been advertised solely through the text messaging venue, tens of thousands would have still shown up to support both the cause and the performers. Most people are followers of some sort of religion and religion is such a personal and sensitive topic that it would be easy to mobilize such an event especially because it would be encouraged by older people as well. And people are so cheap that anytime there is word of anything being free, people storm by the masses and take everything. One instance of this occurred in Virginia a few months back. A high school had purchased Apple Computers early on in the year but ended up signing a deal with Dell instead. Therefore they ended up giving away all the previously purchased computers for FREE and the storms of people waiting resulted in chaos.
Unfortunately, even though these three things have the most potential in succeeding to draw forth such crowds, there is still a strong possibility the mobilization efforts would fail. If the news were spread solely by texts and without other forms of promotion, most people receiving the text would doubt the authenticity of the text. Others would not have time to pull away from their schedule to attend such a mobilization and lastly, texting is still not cheap enough for everyone to take advantage of such an event. It costs me 10 cents for every text message I send and if the message is too long, the phone company counts the text as two separate messages. Our country is technologically advanced and we have other branches of smart mobs but in terms of texting and physical mobilizations, we still have awhile to go.
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