PSUTXT service will send news, emergency info to students’ cell phones and mobile devices
Omnilert LLC, the leading provider of selective mass communications, today announced The Pennsylvania State University has chosen Omnilert for creating a revolutionary new wireless campus news service to be offered to students, faculty and staff. Penn State Live now sends instant SMS text messages of news and emergency information to subscribers’ mobile phones using the Omnilert Web-based communication system.
“Penn State has a news Web site, Penn State Live, and more than three dozen companion listserv-based Penn State Newswires that offer the latest news and information about Penn State to more than 365,000 subscribers around the world. We were on the cutting-edge of electronic communications when we developed that system more than 10 years ago, and it’s continuing to grow,” said Annemarie Mountz, assistant director of Public Information for Internet communications at Penn State. “In fact, roughly 6,000 incoming students subscribed to our Student Newswire in just the past two months. However, the way people — especially young people — communicate continues to change. Text-messaging on cell phones has become the communications vehicle of choice for many students, so giving them the Penn State news they want through a text-messaging news service is the next logical step in the evolution of the Live/Newswire system.”
Mountz continued, “Omnilert is really simple to use. We log into the SMS system on our Penn State Live site to create new SMS messages, type in the message, click on the categories and hit send. Only the people who signed up for the selected categories will get the message. The initial response has been great.”
About Omnilert, LLC
Omnilert LLC is the leading provider of selective mass communications for sending time-sensitive information to large groups of people. The self-service, Web-based system enables a single person to communicate timely information to thousands of people anywhere, anytime, on any device. It is ideal for announcing school closings, game cancellations, weather warnings, terrorist alerts, and marketing promotions. The system is built around a reliable SMS text messaging system that sends content directly to a mobile phone, as well as an e-mail address, Web page, pager or wired phone. The privately held company is headquartered in Leesburg, Va., and at http://www.omnilert.com online.
