I read today about how there was a lockdown on the UBC campus recently. The CBC article I read mentioned that UBC is building a text message alert system for students (and faculty I presume).
So far only 40% of the students have signed up so far.
My thought was why is UBC building this system? Their system can only contact the phones they know of. If that person is away on vacation, and the system is activated, they will get a message. Also, how fast can UBC’s system pump out the text messages?
Wouldn’t it make more sense to get the cell phone providers to do this? They could blanket a specific area and get every phone in that target area. I bet they even have a broadcast functionality already built in too. To me this would seem way more effective and useful. Telus, Rogers, and Bell. Easy, peasy.