Recently I came across an article in TheHindu titled “Make money through the mobile phone”, obviously being from the telecom VAS industry these words are more precious than gold. One does get curious about what new idea someone has hatched that may lead to the next Big thing in the Telecom industry.
the actual article is here
http://www.hindu.com/2009/08/09/stories/2009080952741000.htm

The summary of the article is that txteagle.com is bringing the concept of crowdsourcing to the masses thru the mobile, and better still the users will be able to get paid for their efforts. Mobile being the natural extension of Internet, is the logical next step in evolution to carry Crowdsourcing to the next level, and Txteagle.com has harnessed on the power of both Mobile and Crowdsorucing.

Crowdsourcing is not a new concept, the most common day-to-day example of crowdsourcing is when one makes buying decisions about a product or service based on reviews or feedback published online. which basically translates to making a complex decision based on smaller inputs from others, i.e. crowdsourcing

India is the  logical market for this because of factors like mobile penetration and Mobile usage. also given the fact that lot of younger generation now has mobile in its hands and given an opportunity, will use it to generate extra spending money.

txteagle could be the next big thing, given it finds the clients and projects that are ready to embrace this new kind of outsourcing model. Does India have opportunities like these? sure it has… there are Localization, translation, Knowledge enhancement  projects already undertaken in India.

txteagle cites Citizen journalism as one of the use-cases, derived on the same concept but instead of News, one popular update people give regularly is traffic updates. what if these updates could be used by SatNav systems and help others predict a better traveling route. that may be little far fetched example for Dehli, but still the concept of Mapping companies creating more accurate & up-to-date maps based on inputs from commuters, is a win-win situation for both.
If Google were to implement this model for its mapping solutions,  it could have a content rich map complete with details of all shops in a road, and that too in a fraction of time that it will take with its normal methods.

if opportunities like these can be identified then txteagle can be a unique channel for the consumers, and this will be the first channel that will bring them revenue also.