Story by
Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten
Founder & board member, TNWBoris is a serial entrepreneur who founded not only TNW, but also V3 Redirect Services (sold), HubHop Wireless Internet Provider (sold), and Boris is a serial entrepreneur who founded not only TNW, but also V3 Redirect Services (sold), HubHop Wireless Internet Provider (sold), and pr.co. Boris is very active on Twitter as @Boris and Instagram: @Boris.
It might take a while before we can welcome Pope Benedict to Facebook and Twitter but in July he will text message thousands of young Catholics on their mobile phones during World Youth Day in Sydney. The catholic church hopes that going digital will help them connect better with younger people.
The Pope will personally send daily short messages to the estimated 225,000 youngsters attending the event. Next to texting they will also erect digital prayer walls at event sites.
The church will set up a Catholic social networking Web site that will compete with Facebook. So much for adopting existing technologies.
The technology will be provided by Australian telecoms firm Telstra. They plan to connect 8,000 volunteers, 2,000 clergy, 3,000 media and an anticipated 225,000 pilgrims to more than 700 locations around Sydney.
The Catholic church is the biggest in Australia with about 5 million members. Lets hope they all sign-up for GodBook, Godtube and Praytter.
Amen.