Texting to save Haiti

If you turn on any news station, as well as the television in general, you will see foundations talking about how you can help the people in Haiti get resources for their devastating eartquake occurrance. Companies such as American Red Cross, Clinton's Foundation's Haiti Relief Fun, and Doctors without Borders have all been utilizing the text message in order to get donations for Haiti. Each foundation gives a word and number to text from your sell phone, and in the American Red Cross's case, ten dollars will be automatically billed to your cell phone company, and the money will go directly to the foundation.

This cell-phone philanthropy has raked in millions of dollars for foundations, making it easy for everyday people to pick up their cell phone and contribute with little effort. Text messaging is so popular amongst all ranges of ages of people, so using this knowledge foundations are spreading the regions they can get to donate money for haiti. I know, that it is sometimes easier to text people instead of calling, so with this in mind getting people to donate through text messages seems like a genius idea. With the media coverage Haiti is getting, the power of media is used by the American Red cross to spread the word of how easy it is to help. This marketing scheme is very effective, and is able to use modern technology such as text messaging. In today's culture when everyone is watching television and is obsessed with technology such as cell phones, being able to make the best of this obsession shows that technology is not necessarily always a bad thing, and can be used for good. The use of media like tv, facebook, and twitter are being used for other things besides trashy updates, photos, and sitcoms. Because of how many users there are on facebook, the word of donating through text messages skyrocketed. Within 48 hours of the tragedy, Red Cross says that their donations received through text messaging has raised more money than they did for Hurrican Katrina and the Tsunami Disaster.

While culture at first saw text messaging as a step backward in communications, and thought that it was not as personal as talking over the phone or in person, this shows that texting can actually do for the good. Theres a lot of bad media about how texting while driving can cause accidents, and this is true and should not be done, but the good press texting is getting in its current generation of donations shows in the pro column. When donating ten dollars is as easy as texting on the cell phone right in front of you, why wouldn't you contribute?