Buzz

As American Idol's success has shown, people love to vote -- and to see how others have voted. But why limit electronic polling to TV land? Why can't any audience anywhere be polled, whenever, with the results projected for all to see? Now, a service called Poll Everywhere makes it pretty simple to offer this...

Poll Everywhere, a Y Combinator company that launched last Fall, is a service that allows presenters to sidestep these obstacles [proprietary devices] by taking polls with mobile phones. Instead of using a proprietary device, users simply send a SMS message to a specified number. This data can then be displayed on a dynamic PowerPoint slide, allowing users to watch the results change on the fly.

Need to know how many folks coming to your big bash prefer beer, wine, or soda? [...] You can also send a link to your polling page by email, Twitter, or whatever service you'd like, but the convenience of having to text less than 10 characters back likely boosts your return rate...

Using audience response system technology provided by $100K mobile semi-finalist team Poll Everywhere, the crowd morphed into a brainy version of American Idol, texting their votes in immediate response...

Poll Everywhere's technology allows users to conduct polls via mobile text messaging and then watch the results in real time via programs like Microsoft Corp.'s PowerPoint.

The live interactive text messaging polling service had people captivated and engaged as the audience eagerly watched the percentages on the bar chart fluctuate as votes poured in from phones to determine the crowd favorite and who would win $10,000.

I have written before about trying to find a way for basic cell phones to replace the expensive classroom performance systems (CPS) ... Now, I have found another web2.0 that works in the same fashion as a CPS tool.