As we all know, “DWT” (Driving While Texting) can be hazardous. I’ve seen many drivers
sending or reading text messages from behind the wheel. It's bad enough that Americans
eat, apply makeup or shave in their cars. Now, some drivers have turned these
2,800-pound machines hurtling down the highway at 65 mph into home offices.
It’s so dangerous, in fact, that this year, nine states have considered legislation
specifically banning driving while texting. Washington became the first state to pass a law,
which takes effect in January, making DWT a crime with a $101 fine.
OK, I admit it, I’ve done it as well and have also had a few close calls. Have you?
It was this fact that got me excited this week about using a Web-based unified messaging
service named Jott. The company offers a free (for now) Web-based service for sending
e-mail and text messages to others via voice phone calls. This means you don’t have to
type the message on your cell phone, but simply call Jott’s automated voice command
system. You tell the nice computer-voice lady to whom you want to send the message and
then dictate the message and hang up. It’s that simple. You do all this without having to
look down at your phone’s keypad to type while driving your car.
Jott can send your dictated voice message converted via e-mail and a text message as
both text and as a sound file.
Setting up my Jott account was pretty easy. The only issue I ran into was during the
process of importing my contact list. Jott lets you manually enter new contacts through
your MyJott page but also supports importing of contact lists from Plaxo, Gmail, Yahoo
Mail, Hotmail and Outlook.
I ran into a problem with getting all my contact information to import; it took first name,
e-mail and cell phone number, but not last name for some reason.
Once I got all my contacts imported and organized, I began to poke around the application
and discovered several additional features that I’ve found to be very convenient. These
include the ability to create and store timed reminders and also the ability to place contacts
into groups for group messaging and alerts. Imagine being able to send a group e-mail or
text message from your cell phone without typing. So far, I’ve done this a number of times
and found that it works great.
Jott also supports “links” to other Web-based services you may find useful. For example, if
you have a blog that you publish on either Blogger, TypePad, WordPress or LiveJournal,
you can use Jott to voice-draft a new blog and then post-publish to your blog page.
Jott also interfaces with real estate site Zillow.com and enables you to grab real estate
property information via Jott voice call. You call Jott, say “Zillow” and then the name of the
address you want to get information on. Jott sent me back a text message with all the
relevant property information I was looking for.
It seems to me that Jott’s business model really can only take one of two paths. Either the
service will continue to be offered for free and Jott will generate revenue through
advertisements on its Web pages, or they will, at some point, offer the service through a
paid subscription model.
It’s a terrific service and I encourage you to give it a try. Once you try Jott, let me know
what you think by commenting below or by sending me a Jott.