More From SXSW
The following guest entry was written by Julie Barko Germany, deputy director for the Institute for Politics, Democracy and the Internet. She is attending the South By Southwest festival in Austin.
What's more exciting: the new Apple iPhone or the possibility that 2008 will see the first mobile-powered political movement? Here in Austin at SXSW Interactive, the answer is "both."
I just finished speaking on the Mobile Active panel with Justin Oberman, Roger Desai, Jed Alpert and Doug Busk, where the discussion centered on how advocacy groups can use mobile technology more effectively. During the Q&A session, a member of the audience asked us if the iPhone will change the way Americans use mobile technology.
It will certainly make mobile technology cooler (iTunes! Video! Snappy design!). With a company like Apple backing it, the carriers will certainly listen. And yes, people will probably run over each other to buy one when the iPhone is released later this summer.
For a politically minded techie like me, it has the potential to do something else: change minds about how mobile technology can be used creatively and effectively in the political space to connect people in real time to a political cause and mobilize them to take immediate (and sometimes offline) action.
Text messaging ain't e-mail. And the mobile phone is useful for a heck of a lot more than sending SMS (text message) updates. You just have to look at it differently.
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