January 3, 2005
Cellphones Help With Disaster Relief
The Wall Street Journal reports on SMS fund raising efforts for disaster relief.
"In the week since the tsunami struck, ordinary people around the world have donated millions of dollars for disaster relief. One innovative tool for raising money: the humble cellphone."
Campaigns not mentioned before in this column:
-- In Spain, Telefonica Moviles, "is advertising a number to which customers can send a text message costing 90 European cents, according to a company spokesman. The money is donated to a charity chosen by the customer from a list included in the text message, the spokesman said.
-- Hong Kong's biggest mobile operator, the "3" service of conglomerate Hutchison Whampoa Ltd., started sending text messages to its subscribers urging them to punch in a special disaster-relief code on their phones. When users tap out the short code, they automatically make a 33 Hong Kong dollar (US$4.25) donation to Unicef.
-- China Resources Peoples Telephone Co. of Hong Kong on Thursday sent a text message to about 600,000 of its subscribers telling them how to donate money to the local Red Cross. "
Related articles:
-- Roundup of tsunami relief SMS fund raising campaigns around the world
-- Links to all Tsunami/cell phone stories posted in Textually.org.
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