Pinoy texters lauded at US conference

MANILA, Philippines — Filipinos were praised at a conference in the United States for their use of mobile phones to promote consumer welfare and social change. Militant consumer group TXTPower said the praise came at the Beyond Broadcast 2009 conference at the University of Southern California-Annenberg School for Communication in Los Angeles. “Filipinos sometimes take for granted the way we use our cell phones. But in reality, we are among the most sophisticated mobile phone users, be it regarding the maximum use of available technologies or using them for personal end or political causes," TXTPower president Anthony Ian Cruz, who participated in the event from June 5 to 6, said on the TXTPower website (www.txtpower.org). At the conference, Cruz recalled the group’s anti-text tax campaign in 2004 when irate consumers texted then-House Speaker Jose de Venecia Jr. De Venecia was eventually compelled to set aside a bill imposing a new tax on text messages, he said. In 2005, he narrated how cell phones were used as a form of political protest, with political ring tones being passed around during the “Hello Garci" scandal. A similar distribution of political ring tones took place in 2007 at the height of the $329.48-million ZTE broadband network deal mess. “The Hello Garci ringtones, downloaded by hundreds of thousands, became, arguably, the first political ringtones in the world. We are proud to have hosted and popularized them through our website and thereby provided Filipinos a new way to express their disgust over President Arroyo’s fraudulent election in 2004," said Cruz. Cruz said that Filipinos made at least three dozen ringtones, including some made by popular disc jockeys, who contacted TXTPower discreetly in 2005. He said a third wave of ring tones may be expected to protest a recent passage of a resolution in the House of Representatives for Charter change through constituent assembly. “We expect a new ringtone and perhaps even live citizen coverage of the upcoming anti-Charter Change (Chacha), anti-Constituent Assembly (conass) protest actions," said Cruz. - GMANews.TV