Keene411 - SMS Text Message Blast Service

[FTL_Ian]

Thanks to one of our Manchester liberty activist friends, Keene411 has launched! It’s like an SMS party line. You send a text to a phone number and the message is blasted out to an unlimited number of phones via Twitter. Here are the instructions for signing up:

   1. Create a Twitter account and verify your email, or have your user name and password handy.
   2. Complete these quick phone setup steps in your Twitter settings.
   3. Go to twitter.com/keene411 and click follow.
   4. You should see a green box with two arrows and a lighter box with a phone. Click the phone (it should turn green).
   5. To send out a Keene411, send an SMS text message of no more than 140 characters to 347-603-0411. (You may send txts to this number from any phone, regardless of whether is is signed up for Keene411.)  Please remember to sign your txts, so we know who is sending them.

 This information will always be available in the top menu and via this shortcut: 411.freekeene.com  You can also learn about how to sign up for Manch411 and follow the Kwik411 blog here.

[☺™]

Anyone know how to register Google Voice to a twitter account?  GV seems to reject their short code 40404.

[Travis]

Here's my tutorial:

Create a Gmail account
Create a Twitter account, and verify it
Go to TwitterCounter.com and click "Your twitter stats"
Scroll down and click "Add yourself. It's free."
A Twitter window will pop up, click "Allow"
That window will close itself and you'll be logged in, click the "Twittermail" tab
Copy your secret Twittermail email address
Turn off "Post an attached image to twitpic"
Find the "Twitter password" box and type it in
Turn "Send replies to my tweets to my email address" and click "Save settings"
Go back to Twitter and click "Settings" at the top, click the "Notices" tab
Make sure all options are off
Go to your Gmail account, click "Settings" at the top, click the "Forwarding and POP/IMAP" tab
Send your Google Voice invite to your Gmail address.
You'll get an email for Google Voice. Set up the account. Make sure to get a new Google number
Log in to Google Voice, click "Settings", click the "Voicemail and SMS" tab
Make sure "Forward SMS messages to my email" is on and click "Save Changes"

If you've already got Twitter and Google Voice:

Go to twittermail.com and set up an account. It's a crappy site and you may need to reload a few times. Sometimes not.
Twittermail will give you a randomEmailAddress@twittermail.com.
Make sure your Google Voice settings have SMS messages sent to your email.
I've only done this with Gmail but it should work with an email service. Have that email forwarded to your twittermail address.
And, that should do it.

I have agora411 and 420at420 ready to go, just need GV invites. PM me about that if you've got 'em. I think an NH TextPorc411 may be in order, a Traveling Porc411 for MHD and Liberty Caravan and such maybe.

There's more to come with using the twitter API directly, using Google's speech to text engine, and scraping those emails a bit. Looking into that now.

Lotta ins, lotta outs.

[error]

OK, it took me several tries, but I think I finally figured out (more or less) how this works. I would strongly suggest trying to make it less confusing.

One word of warning, most PREPAID phones cannot send a text to 40404 or any other shortcode.

[Dalebert]

OK, it took me several tries, but I think I finally figured out (more or less) how this works. I would strongly suggest trying to make it less confusing.

Agreed. I was excited about signing up last night but then got discouraged and put it off.

One word of warning, most PREPAID phones cannot send a text to 40404 or any other shortcode.

Well, fart-knockers. I have Tracfone.

[error]

As far as I can tell, this whole thing came about because several people have "not-very-smart" phones which don't have large screens and web browsers which can go sign up for Porc 411 directly on the phones. Most of these CAN be signed up and get messages (except Tracfone) but right now they have to be signed up manually. To date, most of the people I know of in this situation have not decided to sign up their phones.

That said, having SMS is a pretty good idea, though I prefer to minimize dependency on third party services such as Google Voice. I feel that using these services carries too great a risk of interference from government bureaucrats. Since there's clearly some interest, I'm investigating various ways to do this, but I also believe in doing things "right" so I'm not going to throw up something that may have to be torn down and replaced later.

[FTL_Ian]

If it gets taken down, something else can be put up.  It works, delivering txts mere seconds after sending.  If you can come up with something more bulletproof, that's cool, but no need to wait until then to get started with this neat idea.     Thank you Travis!

[FTL_Ian]

I see Meg, COG, and I think Steve on here.  Everyone else is not in Keene that I know of.  Anyone else got unlimited texting?  If so, hop on!

[Travis]

Mike, I agree about using Google Voice. Though I definitely hate Twitter even more (I only on to get Porc411s on my phone). Askterisk is really where it's at for top-notch activist communications.

This is free. I made a Gmail account, got a GV invite, made a twitter and twittermail account, and tweaked the settings. I really just started this to see if it would work. Now I'm gonna try to bypass Twitter and use Google Voice directly to make this happen. I'm trying to better this free service, but even if I don't, I intend to learn some Python in the process.

[Travis]

New Kwik411s:

Agora 411 - 662.883.0411 - twitter.com/agora411

420 at 420 - 910.420.0411 - twitter.com/420at420

This makes five now. Too many? Probably.

[☺™]

Mike, I agree about using Google Voice. Though I definitely hate Twitter even more (I only on to get Porc411s on my phone). Askterisk is really where it's at for top-notch activist communications.

This is free. I made a Gmail account, got a GV invite, made a twitter and twittermail account, and tweaked the settings. I really just started this to see if it would work. Now I'm gonna try to bypass Twitter and use Google Voice directly to make this happen. I'm trying to better this free service, but even if I don't, I intend to learn some Python in the process.

Why not just have GV forward texts to an email-based mailing list?  I think all cell phones have an email address that forwards to texts.  So you'd just need a signup form where participants enter their phone number and mobile carrier.   Maybe google groups could handle this, but maybe some other mailing list software would be more flexible.

[FTL_Ian]

What is the intent of Agora411?

The 420 thing does seem repetitive, as people in Manch and Keene can use their respective 411s.

[TackleTheWorld]

I have the lowest-end non-smart tracfone lg200c and I was able to sign up.  It took a few tries, but twitter sends you instructions as you go.  Waiting for the next blast to see if it works.

[TackleTheWorld]

Confirmed:  non-smart tracfones can get Keene411 messages. 
Let the flash mobs begin!

[FTL_Ian]

Signup process shortened.  Check top post for updated instructions.