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View Full Version : Vatican Used SMS to Announce Pope's Death


Mike Temporale
04-04-2005, 06:45 PM
<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://today.reuters.co.uk/News/NewsArticle.aspx?type=internetNews&storyID=2005-04-03T155211Z_01_HOL357011_RTRIDST_0_OUKIN-POPE-INTERNET.XML' target='_blank'>http://today.reuters.co.uk/News/NewsArticle.aspx?type=internetNews&storyID=2005-04-03T155211Z_01_HOL357011_RTRIDST_0_OUKIN-POPE-INTERNET.XML</a><br /><br /></div><i>"It took just minutes for the Vatican to alert the world's media of Pope John Paul's death -- using text messages and email so the 2,000-year-old Church could meet the new demands of real-time news. Just a quarter of an hour after the Pope was pronounced dead on Saturday at 9:37 p.m. (8.37 p.m. British time), the Vatican sent journalists an SMS message alerting them to a pending statement. Television networks across the globe were already on standby a minute later when the email communique was beamed to a sea of state-of-the-art handheld computers, purchased by journalists at the suggestion of the Vatican. "The Holy father died this evening at 21:37 in his private apartment," it said, in a simple Word document."</i><br /><br />Hey, wait a second, I never got that SMS! :wink: On a serious note, it's very interesting to see the adoption of technology and it can be used for more than just chatting with friends and cheating on exams. Anyone know of other places where SMS is being used to get the message out? And I'm not just referring to religion, I'm talking about any good non-spam use. :wink:

guardedthought
04-04-2005, 07:19 PM
Before I switched to a personal exchange email provider, I used SMS to send myself my "reminders" throughout the day. If I saw or read something that I knew I would need reminding of, I would sms it to myself to pick up later in the day.

Now adays, the only thing I use SMS for is for the ActiveSync trigger between my smartphone and exchange server.

chucky.egg
04-04-2005, 07:46 PM
This smells a bit fishy to me

he email communique was beamed to a sea of state-of-the-art handheld computers, purchased by journalists at the suggestion of the Vatican
So journo's the world over look to the Vatican for technical advice do they?

There are quite a few innovative uses of SMS in the UK at the moment.
I'm working on a system where people needing help with housing (not just the homeless) can send a text message to register an interest in a property that's advertised. No internet access, or forms required.

We also use the system for general news to residents in our District, as well as plans for future polls on local services.

Another Council operates a system that tells you how many parking spaces there are in town car parks, in real-time.

The Sally Army did a "24hr Prayer" thing a while back, where people involved could be sent a text message when their 10-minute slot came up

The best one (for me anyway) is the ability to reboot servers, unlock user accounts, ping stuff etc. from anywhere. I get paid to be on call and this means I can still do that from virtually anywhere on the planet.

Mark Larson
04-04-2005, 08:48 PM
So they used a Word doc and PDAs for a few bytes of text that could just as easily be SMSed to the journos? :?

Jerry Raia
04-04-2005, 11:18 PM
I get SMS traffic alerts for Los Angeles. Considering that all the freeways are a huge mess all the time anyway, its kinda worthless. :lol: