a note on textmarks · posted by vaibhav bhawsar Jan 21, 2007
What is TextMarks ?
why is Textmarks interesting?
I find it interesting because it allows one to publish or subscribe to a certain channel of information by sending a text message from their mobile phone. I haven’t tried it yet but it sounds like an idea which is similar to RSS or ATOM feed for blogs.
You can also publish a blog post from your phone using one of the widgets they provide on the site.
This is how the site defines a textmark:
A testmark is a keyword you select that people can text message to 41411 and receive a custom response from you. Users can also subscribe to your Textmark to get updates and alerts.
The way is see a Textmark is a combination of a chat room and a “TOPIC” discussion or even a mobile shout-box.
An example:
I create a Textmark called “Iamfrustrated” by going to textmarks.com. I need not register at this point. Next I am asked to enter the main body text that will be sent to a subscriber of “Iamfrustrated”. So I enter “I am frustrated by how everyone looks frustrated on the morning train”. So at this point I can make “Iamfrustrated” public so that people can also update it. Now if you are subscribed to “Iamfrustrated” ( which is done by sending “SUB iamfrustrated” to 41411) you can publish or ping people on this channel with whatever you want in less than 100 chars.
(I have set this channel/textmark in real so try it out-see their HELP section for more commands)
There is also an option to publish to a textmark from the site. You can also add a widget to your site which reflects the latest content of a given textmark.
It is a pretty open system of sharing or publishing or broadcasting or narrowcasting or ranting. You subscribe if you care else don’t sort of thing.
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