"Brilliant. Effective. Revolutionary."

Those are the three words I thought I'd write in response to Barack Obama's text message announcing his Vice Presidential pick. Instead, the only word that comes to mind is "Disappointing."

Let me explain...

Having upgraded recently from a BlackBerry to a white 3G iPhone I went ahead and signed up on my new line for the updates. More text messages? No worries, I had already opted for the unlimited text plan so that I could better follow about a dozen or so folks on Twitter without having to track mileage.

I ripped off the text like a pro -- tapping "VP" to 62262 and clicking send. Within seconds I received a response back from 62262 letting me know that the sign-up was a success.

Noting in my little black book of best practices that even the confirmation note had a call to action ("Please forward"), I cracked a smile in recognition of the genius of Obama online guru Joe Rospars and his team.

I thought, could the be the text that's heard around the world as it got forwarded from an initial few to many? What would the text say?

I was pumped and excited for the text. And I'm a Republican who will not vote for Barack Obama regardless of his running mate.

The promise of direct, exclusive information sent to my iPhone was a heckuva carrot to put out on a stick. Not just for me -- but for others too. In fact, last week when I was training 60 field representatives for the College Republicans (a client) I asked the room who else had signed up -- at least a quarter of the hands slowly grabbed the sky.

Days went by last week since I had signed up. I hadn't received a single text from Barack. Was this thing still working? Indeed, a Tweet would pop up reminding me that the foot was still on the pedal. I even thought it was genius that Barack's team had not sent a text to me. I had signed up for one text, at least initially -- don't break the promise or risk losing me.

So... I... Waited... For... Barack...

After a long week at work, I decided to forget about it for the night. I went out with friends, had sushi, saki, and laughs. I went to bed.

When I woke up this morning, I grabbed my iPhone to start reading through late night tweets, text messages, and emails. OMG. WTH is that? a text message from Barack at 3:04 AM? No way...

Confirmed. It was indeed from Obama's campaign -- but it wasn't from Barack -- the person. The text was from Barack Obama -- the Machine.

Using 148 of their 160-character limit the Machine wrote:

Barack has chosen Senator Joe Biden to be our VP nominee. Watch the first Obama-Biden rally live at 3 PM ET on www.BarackObama.com. Spread the word!

What were they thinking by not using Barack's voice? Didn't they realize that I'm used to getting very real, personal text messages from my friends? Didn't they know that even I thought that Barack really "got" this modern medium?

Patrick Ruffini blogged this morning that Barack's text wasn't even really worth the wait because it had leaked to the media beforehand. To quote Patrick, "What seemed like a brilliant exercise in media management devolved into a late night rearguard maneuver." Agreed.

So, if I were working for Barack, I would have suggested the following 160-character text (Leave no character behind!):

Senator Joe Biden is my VP pick. Visit www.BarackObama.com now to see a video message from us to you. You are an important part of the Team for Change. Plz fwd!

But... They didn't. Barack didn't text me anything. The Machine did.

I'm disappointed in Barack's team for missing this opportunity to communicate a direct, personal message from Barack and Joe to their people.

So points for using text messaging as a medium to communicate; however, they're just not doing a good job of using it effectively.

This Thanksgiving, I'm hopeful that you will join me in thanking our troops and their families who are serving overseas.

It's simple to participate and make a difference. In fact beginning at 6 am EST on Saturday, November 17, and ending at midnight PDT on November 22, Americans can text a message of thanks to 8-9-2-7-9.

Within seconds, the sender will receive a reply on his or her cell phone from America Supports You (ASY). The message will come from a member of the armed forces or a family member of someone who is serving, who will express his or her appreciation for the support, both personally and on behalf of others who are serving.

And it works. I sent my text message a few minutes ago and received two replies from soldiers serving in Iraq.

Because all the major mobile wireless providers—AT&T Wireless (Cingular), Verizon, Sprint (Nextel, Qwest), and T-Mobile—will provide access to the ASY text message program, there is no upcharge.

Members of the military and their families—we now have troops serving in 177 countries—will learn the number of text messages and be able to view many of them.

America Supports You expects this effort to be a unifying moment for the nation, at a time in which families traditionally come together and express gratitude for things large and small that contribute to their lives.

Since its formation two and a half years ago, the America Supports You program has welcomed over 300 grassroots organizations and 35 corporate sponsors to its team. Many America Supports You team members support the troops through letter-writing, sending care packages, helping the wounded when they return home, assisting military families, sending an e-mail or making a kind gesture. To learn more about how you can help, please visit www.AmericaSupportsYou.mil.

Pick up your cell phone and send a message of support to our troops at 8-9-2-7-9. They need to hear from you.

UPDATE: Verizon has reversed their decision and will allow NARAL to carry out their campaign.

Thanks to NARAL, we now know that texting isn't considered free speech. While I'm not sad to see a pro-choice group take a few knocks, this has repercussions for everyone.

The US is far behind Europe with our cell phone technology, so SMS or texting has yet to make the impact that it has across the pond. As more political parties and advocacy groups use newer communication technologies to carry controversial messages, we're reminded how much our laws need to catch up with technology.

The Times article points out that texting falls under the Net Neutrality debate that was highlighted here a few weeks ago with the conservative argument for and against it. Yet this Verizon decision takes the issue from a blogosphere debate to a real problem that campaigns face. What happens when you create a great texting plan and one of the largest US carriers refuses to accept it?

Do Republicans support First Amendment protection expanding to all technologies or do they fight government intrusion and hope that competition counters these types of policies?

[Cross posted at Girl from the South]

Barack Obama's campaign has an interesting example of the online-offline integration I talked about a few weeks ago. Having signed up for their text messaging list, I texted in my addresses to get a free Obama bumper sticker. It came yesterday and looks like this:

Aside from feeling some mild disappointment in not receiving the standard Obama'08 sticker to add to my collection, I got to thinking, and this is an interesting viral strategy. If I had to guess, the last thing they want is for this to actually be placed on cars -- you can barely see the call to action. Rather, the point is for it to be stuck on the outside of dorm room doors, where it can spread virally offline among college students. The amount of thought that went into this campaign (I got an SMS telling me my bumper sticker was being packaged up in Chicago with some TLC) shows you the premium they are placing on text messaging versus other forms of online communication.

This piece originally appeared at joshua.trevino.at.

I didn't want an iPhone -- though I had fun with its launch day 48 hours back -- because I haven't the slightest desire to interact with AT&T's inferior network, and because I'm pretty sure that iPhone 2.0 or 3.0 will have some extraordinary feaures and, more important, be unlocked. But I did want an invite to Pownce. I wanted one badly enough to spend a great deal of time insulting Scoble, annoying Susan Wu with mercenary inquiries, and posting public pleas. Partly this was because I'm a sucker for web 2.0 fads, but mostly it was because I'd been doing some thinking about the last such fad, namely, Twitter.

Promoted by E.M.--Fred's campaign takes it one step further...

So, I went to sign in to Fred Thompson’s new website so see what was going on. And I was struck by this:

They want my cell phone provider. With my phone number and my provider, they can send me free, (for them) text messages. And they asked for my IM username. They want to talk to me. The Thompson campaign is the first campaign to ask me for that information. They can send me targeted messages.

That is very cool. And very, very important. This is the first glimpse of how they will use technology differently.